Pride of face in New Zealand

"Even though it's expressed through art on the skin, it's very much about belonging," she said. "And if you don't belong, you shouldn't wear it."

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Even so, Maori tattoos adorn bodies of numerous foreign celebrities. Pop star Williams stirred up a controversy in 2000 when a Maori artist tattooed the singer's arm in New Zealand. A Maori cultural expert complained that the design had been filched from his tribe.

That same year, 50 artists set up a national forum, called Te Uhi A Mataora, to set design and health standards for Maori tattoo artists and protect traditional motifs against abuse in New Zealand and abroad.

"They're very, very sacred designs that are being used in very, very insensitive ways," Kopua said. "For example, some designs that come off people's faces and heads have been put on cups and plates and all those sorts of things."

Maori are also offended by the misuse of moko on people's bodies. Tattoo artists mimicking Maori designs without understanding them draw the patterns upside down, put motifs reserved for women on men or distort the designs in other ways.

"Most of the moko are genealogical," Kopua said. "So when somebody just snatches a design that represents another person's ancestors and puts it anywhere they please, that takes it out of its true context. Our reaction to that is very, very strong."

In 2006, activists complained when a Hollywood costume shop put a "Maori Face" tattoo kit on its shelves. French designer Jean-Paul Gaultier caused a bigger stir last year when men and women modeling his clothes in European editions of Vogue were made up with moko on their faces.

Maori are asserting copyright over their designs at the World Intellectual Property Organization, a United Nations agency in Geneva that promotes the protection of copyrights and patents They have also created toi iho, a registered trademark for authentic Maori-made arts and crafts.

While they fight for their copyright, Maori are quietly struggling to reclaim the dignity of tribal warriors who fell long ago.

The ta moko artists group is working to track down and reclaim the preserved heads of warriors, which are also being stored in New Zealand's Te Papa Tongarewa museum in Wellington for proper burial, Kopua said.

Since 1907, the American Museum of Natural History has had 35 Maori heads in its anthropology collection, but they are in storage and out of public view, said Charles McLean, senior vice president of communications and marketing for the New York museum.