Green’s Dictionary of Slang

(N.Z.) a party or wake, involving (heavy) drinking.

1904		N.Z. Observer 27 Aug. 7: Man-o’-war officers and men [...] held a ‘tangi’ on board last Saturday night over the ashes of the British team [DNZE].
1917		5 Sept. in E. Miller Camps, Tracks and Trenches (1939) 131: A barrel of beer arrived at the cookhouse after tea time, so the section settled down to a large evening. I missed most of the tangi [DNZE].
1926		J. Devanny Butcher Shop 60: They’ll be having a tangi in the evening, I understand.
1938		R. Finlayson Brown Man’s Burden 3: All the friends and relatives of both families were jubilant at the announcement [...] the occasion for a tangi had arisen.
1952		P. Newton High Country Journey 132: I spent Christmas at the Bealey for five consecutive years, and they were ‘tangis’ that are worth remembering.
1960		R.M. Rogers Long White Cloud 13: Hislops are holding a tangi tonight. Tiare invited all of us.
1971		B. Crump ‘Bastards I Have Met’ in Best of Barry Crump (1974) 252: They were on their way home from Ruatahuna to Ngaruwahia for a tangi.
1984		Partridge DSUE (8th edn) 1202/1–2: tangi. [...] Now very commonly adopted here [in New Zealand] by the upper classes, especially as an equivalent of the outmoded ‘beano.’.
2003		McGill Reed Dict. of N.Z. Sl. 208: tangi Dispute or wild party; the former meaning was used by Katherine Mansfield in 1919. Pakeha misrepresentation of a Maori tangi, wake, as a boozy party.