Career
Outu is the phonetic English rendering of ʻO Tū, Tū being the name, ʻo the nominal predicate meaning that is. Older literature writes his family name as Tunuieaiteatua, which leaves incertainties about the proper pronunciation as Tahitian usually did (and does) not write macrons and glottals. Barring this incertainty, in the current proper orthography would be Tū-nui-ʻēʻa-i-te-atua meaning Great-Tū,-road-to-the-god.
Tū (standing straight up) was a major Tahitian god.
Ariʻitaimai claims that this Tū is a contraction of atua (god), but that is unlikely. The name Pōmare was adopted later.
He was born at Pare, ca. He initially reigned under the regency of his father, 1753, and succeeded on the death of his father as Ariʻi-rahi of Porionuʻu November 23, 1802.
As king, Pōmare succeeded in uniting the different chiefdoms of Tahiti into a single kingdom, composed of the islands of Tahiti itself, Moʻorea, Mehetiʻa, and the Tetiʻaroa group.
His service as the first king of unified Tahiti ended when he abdicated in 1791, but he remained the regent of Tahiti from 1791 until 1803. He died from thrombosis. He was succeeded by Tū Tūnuiʻēʻaiteatua Pōmare II, who reigned 1803-1821.