page_title: Tui Manu'a Matelita
section_title: Death and legacy
hierarchical_section_title: Tui Manu'a Matelita / Death and legacy
caption_attribution_description: English: Monument To The Late Queen of Manua.
context_page_description: Tui Manu'a Matelita, born Margaret Young, and also known as Makelita, Matelika or Lika was the Tui Manu'a from 1891 to 1895. She ruled over Manu'a, a group of islands in the eastern part of the Samoan Islands. During her tenure, she served largely a ceremonial role at her residence on Ta'ū where she received British writer Robert Louis Stevenson. Matelita never married because she would not marry any of the eligible native chieftains and no other men were regarded as having the proper rank to marry her. She died of illness in 1895 although later reports claimed she died by a more violent means. She was buried in the Tui Manu'a Graves Monument.
context_section_description: Matelita fell ill in September 1895 and died peacefully in her sleep, after the illness, on 29 October 1895.
  Later sources claimed she died after a kerosene lamp overturned causing her mosquito net to catch fire while she slept. This is not supported by contemporary sources of the Protestant missionaries which stated she died of illness. Elisala was elected as her successor to the title Tui Manu'a in 1899. After Elisala's death, the title was abolished by the United States, which had earlier incorporated the islands as a part of American Samoa. Matelita's brother Chris Taliutafa Young unsuccessfully attempted to claim the Tui Manu'a in 1924.
  After her death, she was buried next to some of the preceding Tui Manu'a title holders and eventually her successor Elisala after his death. A marble monument was built over her final resting place. The 6–7 ft (1.8–2.1 m) tombstone, which is the most visible monument in the royal burial ground that is delineated by a stone enclosure, consisted of a round column on a square base. The inscriptions on the base memorializes, in both the English and Samoan language, the life of the Tui Manu'a including the words: These are my last words to you all, "May you live in peace". This grave site known as the Tui Manu'a Graves Monument was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 2015.
  American anthropologist Margaret Mead, who conducted research in Samoa between 1925 and 1926, was given the name Makelita by locals in her memory. During a local marriage ceremony, Mead also wore a dress woven by the late queen.
caption: Monument To The Late Queen of Manua, 1896
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