Northland
Te Tai Tokerau
Where Māori and Europeans first lived and traded alongside each other at scale, and where both He Whakaputanga and Te Tiriti were signed. The Bay of Islands was the busiest port in the country before Auckland existed.
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14 events in Northland between 1809 and 1920
The burning of the Boyd
Between 66 and 70 crew and passengers were killed and the ship burned at Whangaroa, after the flogging of a rangatira’s son aboard. For some years afterwards few ships came to New Zealand.
Whangaroa HarbourSamuel Marsden’s first Christian service
Marsden preached at Oihi Bay on Christmas Day 1814 under the protection of Ruatara, beginning the first permanent mission station in New Zealand.
Oihi Bay, RangihouaHongi Hika travels to England
The Ngāpuhi leader met King George IV in London, then traded most of the gifts he received for muskets on the return journey through Sydney.
Bay of IslandsKororāreka, the south’s biggest whaling port
Whaling crews, traders, grog shops and no British law earned the town its reputation as the hell-hole of the Pacific.
Kororāreka (Russell)Northern chiefs petition King William IV
Thirteen rangatira asked the King to be a friend and guardian of these islands, worried by runaway sailors and other troublesome Europeans, and by rumours of French designs.
KerikeriJames Busby arrives as British Resident
Britain’s first Resident in New Zealand arrived with a grand title, no troops, little money and no legal authority — remembered as a man-of-war without guns.
WaitangiThe flag of the United Tribes is chosen
About 25 northern rangatira selected a national flag so that New Zealand-built ships could be registered and trade legally.
WaitangiHe Whakaputanga — Declaration of Independence
He Whakaputanga o te Rangatiratanga o Nu Tireni
Rangatira of the United Tribes declared New Zealand an independent state, with sovereignty and authority over the land resting with the rangatira.
WaitangiBishop Pompallier founds the Catholic mission
Jean Baptiste Pompallier landed at Hokianga, breaking the Protestant monopoly on missionary work and adding a French presence that unsettled the British.
Tōtara Point, HokiangaWilliam Hobson is sent to negotiate a treaty
The Colonial Office instructed Hobson to obtain the free and intelligent consent of Māori to British sovereignty — the brief that produced Te Tiriti six months later.
Te Tiriti o Waitangi is signed
Te Tiriti o Waitangi
Around 540 rangatira signed Te Tiriti at Waitangi and at more than 50 meetings around the country. The English and te reo Māori texts do not say the same thing, and never have.
WaitangiThe Northern War
Ngā Pakanga i te Tai Tokerau
Hōne Heke and his supporters felled the British flagstaff at Kororāreka four times, the last during the attack in which he and Kawiti sacked the town. Ngāpuhi fought on both sides. The war ended at Ruapekapeka, an engineered pā built to absorb artillery.
Kororāreka and RuapekapekaTe Kotahitanga — the Māori Parliament
Te Kotahitanga o Te Tiriti o Waitangi
A Māori parliament met from 1892 to 1902, seeking authority over Māori land and people under the Treaty of Waitangi and petitioning Parliament for recognition.
Waipatu, Hawke’s BayThe Rātana movement rises
Te Hāhi Rātana
Tahupōtiki Wiremu Rātana built a church and then a political movement that campaigned for the Treaty of Waitangi to be honoured.
Rātana PāMeanwhile, nationally
11 events that reached Northland along with most of the country. They still shade the map and sit on the timeline above, but they are not Northland’s own history.
The Musket Wars
Musket-armed war parties reshaped the map of Māori New Zealand. Perhaps 20,000 died and whole districts changed hands before the fighting burned out around 1840.
The Native Land Court is established
The court converted customary communal title into individual titles that could be sold, and became the main means by which most remaining Māori land passed out of Māori ownership.
Tohunga Suppression Act
An Act making it an offence to practise as a tohunga, aimed at healers who claimed supernatural powers and at prophets such as Rua Kēnana.
The influenza pandemic
About 9,000 people died in two months — roughly half as many as died in four years of war. Māori died at more than eight times the Pākehā rate.
The 28th (Māori) Battalion
Te Hokowhitu-a-Tū
A volunteer battalion organised by tribal area fought in Greece, Crete, North Africa and Italy. Its casualty rate was almost 50% above the average for New Zealand infantry battalions.
Māori War Effort Organisation
Over 300 tribal committees took on Māori recruiting, war work and local food production; Māori felt that for the first time they bore real responsibility for their own affairs.
The great Māori urban migration
Māori went from 26 percent urban in 1945 to nearly 80 percent by 1986 — a migration Te Ara says has been described as the most rapid movement of any population.
The Māori land march
Te Rōpū Matakite o Aotearoa
Whina Cooper, aged 79, led a month-long hīkoi from Te Hāpua in the far north to Parliament under the slogan ‘not one more acre’.
Te HāpuaRogernomics — the economy is deregulated
A Labour government floated the dollar, removed farm subsidies and tariffs, and sold state assets in a radical programme of market liberalisation.
Te reo Māori becomes an official language
Te Ture mō Te Reo Māori
Te reo Māori gained official status and the right to be spoken in court, fifteen years after the language petition and following a Waitangi Tribunal finding that it was a taonga.
The Sealord fisheries settlement
The Crown funded a Māori half-share in Sealord and allocated quota, settling commercial fisheries claims nationally in one deal.