Many Māori movements adopted distinctive flags. This is Te Kooti’s war flag. The meaning of the symbols on it has been much debated. The letters ‘WI’ probably stood for the Holy Spirit, Wairua Tapu. The crescent moon was a tohu (portent) of a new world; the red cross was the fighting cross of the Archangel Michael, who appeared to Te Kooti in a vision in the 1850s. The moon and cross reiterate the first two elements of Te Wepu, a flag which Te Kooti captured from Ngāti Kahungunu in 1868.
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