Maori, New and Old

The Maori got to New Zealand first. They have been the tangata whenua, the indigenous people of what they named Aotearoa. Arriving from the Polynesian homeland of Hawaiki over 1,000 years ago, the great explorer Kupe, was the first Māori to reach these lands and call it their own. These populations all descend from Polynesian settlers who sailed to the Society Islands and Austral Islands over 1,000 years ago. The Society and Austral Islands later served as the origin point for migrations to the remaining remote Polynesian Islands, such as Hawaii, New Zealand, and Rapa Nui (Easter Island). They had a robust culture that inevitably clashed with the British who arrived after them, and they were left with little choice but to assimilate.

That was then and this is now. About 18% of New Zealanders identify as part Maori. Many Māori cultural practices are kept alive in contemporary New Zealand. All formal Māori gatherings are accompanied by oratory in Māori; action songs; formal receptions of visitors, accompanied by the hongi, or pressing together of noses on greeting, and sometimes by ritual challenges; and cooking of food in earth ovens (hāngī) on preheated stones. Carved houses, which serve as centres of meeting and ceremony in Māori villages, are still being erected. For many Māori people, the most significant issue in New Zealand remains that of the land, which are largely unresolved.