Hawaiian tradition says Līloa left the kingdom to his son Hākau and the gods to his low-born son ʻUmi, and ʻUmi killed Hākau and took the island

The legends collected by Abraham Fornander say that Līloa, ruling chief of Hawaiʻi Island, kept his court at Waipiʻo. His wife bore him a son, Hākau. On a journey Līloa seduced a young woman of humble life, Akahiakuleana, and left her his ivory clasp, feather lei and loincloth, telling her to send the child to Waipiʻo with them if it was a boy. When her son ʻUmi was grown, she produced the tokens. ʻUmi climbed over the stockade, entered by the back door and sat in Līloa's lap. Līloa saw the tokens and acknowledged him publicly. Near death, Līloa gave the government to Hākau and the care of the gods and temples to ʻUmi, telling Hākau: "You are the ruler of Hawaii, and Umi is your man." Hākau, the legends say, stripped his father's old counsellors of their positions and mocked ʻUmi's mother as low-born. Two of Līloa's priests helped ʻUmi plan a raid on a festival day when Hākau's men were away in the mountains collecting feathers. ʻUmi found Hākau almost alone in Waipiʻo, killed him, and was proclaimed ruler. Fornander notes the legends came from ʻUmi's descendants. Līloa's sash, the kāʻei, passed down through later ruling chiefs to Kamehameha and is now in the Bishop Museum; King Kalākaua used it in his regalia.