Ngati Rangiwewehi elder Trevor Maxwell says Te Arawa values Don Stafford's recording of its stories.
Waatea News reports the historian, who died on Monday in Rotorua, is to be honoured by lying in state in the house Tamatekaua before his funeral at St Faith's Church on Friday.
Mr Maxwell, who is deputy mayor of Rotorua, says Mr Stafford bridged both Maori and European worlds and became a walking encyclopedia on tribal history.
