Pania (Pania of the Reef)

According to the preserved local narrative, Pania was a beautiful sea maiden who lived among the creatures of a reef on the east coast of New Zealand's North Island. She met and secretly married a human man named Karitoki, visiting his whare at night while by daylight she swam with reef creatures. Karitoki, warned by a kaumātua that a sea-creature would be barred from returning to the ocean if she swallowed cooked food, later placed cooked food in Pania's mouth; when her people drew her down to the depths and the sirens of the sea called her at dawn she could no longer return to them as before. Their son, Moremore, became the kaitiaki (guardian) of the area and is described as a taniwha who disguises himself as a shark, stingray or octopus.

The source emphasizes Pania's beauty but gives no detailed physical description beyond that she was 'a beautiful maiden.' Narrative and local sighting motifs record that some people say when looking deep into the water over the reef they can see Pania with arms outstretched, appealing to her former lover. By daylight she is depicted as swimming among the creatures of her reef world; after sunset she travels up a stream into the bay to rest among flax bushes.

The account portrays Pania as a sea-dwelling person-like being who moves daily between the reef and the bay: by daylight she swims with reef creatures and after sunset she ascends a stream into the bay to meet Karitoki. The story recounts a secret human marriage and cohabitation (a narrative event, not a listed supernatural power). Her lineage produces Moremore, who functions as the area's kaitiaki and is described as a taniwha capable of disguising himself as animals such as a shark, stingray or octopus. The narrative also states a cosmological constraint: when the 'sirens of the sea' call each morning she must return to the ocean and that ingesting cooked food would bar a sea-creature from returning.