The Moriori are the native
Polynesian people of the
Chatham Islands
The Chatham Islands ( ) (Moriori: ''Rēkohu'', 'Misty Sun'; mi, Wharekauri) are an archipelago in the Pacific Ocean about east of New Zealand's South Island. They are administered as part of New Zealand. The archipelago consists of about te ...
(''Rēkohu'' in
Moriori
The Moriori are the native Polynesian people of the Chatham Islands (''Rēkohu'' in Moriori; ' in Māori), New Zealand. Moriori originated from Māori settlers from the New Zealand mainland around 1500 CE. This was near the time of th ...
; ' in
Māori
Māori or Maori can refer to:
Relating to the Māori people
* Māori people of New Zealand, or members of that group
* Māori language, the language of the Māori people of New Zealand
* Māori culture
* Cook Islanders, the Māori people of the C ...
),
New Zealand
New Zealand ( mi, Aotearoa ) is an island country in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. It consists of two main landmasses—the North Island () and the South Island ()—and over 700 smaller islands. It is the sixth-largest island count ...
. Moriori originated from
Māori
Māori or Maori can refer to:
Relating to the Māori people
* Māori people of New Zealand, or members of that group
* Māori language, the language of the Māori people of New Zealand
* Māori culture
* Cook Islanders, the Māori people of the C ...
settlers from the New Zealand mainland around 1500 CE. This was near the time of the shift from the archaic to classic Māori culture on the main islands of New Zealand. Oral tradition records multiple waves of migration to the Chatham Islands, starting in the 16th century. Over several centuries these settlers' culture diverged from mainland Māori, developing a
distinctive language (which started as a dialect but gradually became only partially mutually intelligible with
Māori
Māori or Maori can refer to:
Relating to the Māori people
* Māori people of New Zealand, or members of that group
* Māori language, the language of the Māori people of New Zealand
* Māori culture
* Cook Islanders, the Māori people of the C ...
), mythology, artistic expression and way of life. Currently there are around 700 people who identify as Moriori, most of whom no longer live on the Chatham Islands. During the late 19th century some prominent anthropologists mistakenly proposed that Moriori were
pre-Māori settlers of mainland New Zealand, and possibly
Melanesian
Melanesian is the adjectival form of Melanesia. It may refer to:
* Melanesians
* Melanesian mythology
* Melanesian languages In linguistics, Melanesian is an obsolete term referring to the Austronesian languages of Melanesia: that is, the Oceani ...
in origin.
Early Moriori formed tribal groups based on eastern Polynesian social customs and organisation. Later, a prominent
pacifist
Pacifism is the opposition or resistance to war, militarism (including conscription and mandatory military service) or violence. Pacifists generally reject theories of Just War. The word ''pacifism'' was coined by the French peace campaign ...
culture emerged; this was known as the law of ''nunuku'', based on the teachings of the 16th century Moriori leader
Nunuku-whenua
Nunuku-whenua was a Moriori chief who is known for being a sixteenth-century pacifist.
The Moriori, a Polynesian people, migrated to the then-uninhabited Chatham Islands from mainland New Zealand around the year 1500. Following an intertribal con ...
. This culture made it easier for
Taranaki
Taranaki is a region in the west of New Zealand's North Island. It is named after its main geographical feature, the stratovolcano of Mount Taranaki, also known as Mount Egmont.
The main centre is the city of New Plymouth. The New Plymouth Dist ...
Māori invaders to
nearly exterminate them in the 1830s during the
Musket Wars
The Musket Wars were a series of as many as 3,000 battles and raids fought throughout New Zealand (including the Chatham Islands) among Māori between 1807 and 1837, after Māori first obtained muskets and then engaged in an intertribal arms ra ...
. This was the
Moriori genocide, in which the Moriori were either murdered or enslaved by members of the
Ngāti Mutunga
Ngāti Mutunga is a Māori iwi (tribe) of New Zealand, whose original tribal lands were in north Taranaki. They migrated from Taranaki, first to Wellington (with Ngāti Toa and other Taranaki Hāpu), and then to the Chatham Islands (along wit ...
and
Ngāti Tama
Ngāti Tama is a historic Māori iwi of present-day New Zealand which whakapapas back to Tama Ariki, the chief navigator on the Tokomaru waka. The iwi of Ngati Tama is located in north Taranaki around Poutama. The Mōhakatino river marks the ...
iwi, killing or displacing nearly 95% of the Moriori population.
The Moriori, however, were not extinct, and gained
aroha
Aroha is a Māori word meaning "love", cognate with the Hawaiian term ''aloha''. It is also a given name.
Notable people
Notable people with the name include:
* Aroha Awarau, journalist and playwright from New Zealand
* Aroha Reriti-Crofts, ...
and recognition as New Zealand's second
indigenous people
Indigenous peoples are culturally distinct ethnic groups whose members are directly descended from the earliest known inhabitants of a particular geographic region and, to some extent, maintain the language and culture of those original people ...
over the course of the next century, even if what happened to them was taught sparingly due to government suppression of knowledge of the genocide. Their culture and language underwent a revival, and Moriori names for their islands were prioritised. In February 2020, the New Zealand government signed a treaty with tribal leaders, giving them rights enshrined in law and the Moriori people at large an apology, returning stolen remains of those killed in the genocide, and gifting NZD$18 million in reparations. On 23 November 2021, the New Zealand government enshrined in law the treaty between Moriori and the Crown. The law is called the Moriori Claims Settlement Bill. It includes an agreed summary history that begins with the words "Moriori karāpuna (ancestors) were the waina-pono (original inhabitants) of Rēkohu, Rangihaute, Hokorereoro (South East Island), and other nearby islands (making up the Chatham Islands). They arrived sometime between 1000 and 1400 CE
''.
History
Origin
The Moriori are ethnically
Polynesian. They developed a distinct Moriori culture in the
Chatham Islands
The Chatham Islands ( ) (Moriori: ''Rēkohu'', 'Misty Sun'; mi, Wharekauri) are an archipelago in the Pacific Ocean about east of New Zealand's South Island. They are administered as part of New Zealand. The archipelago consists of about te ...
as they adapted to local conditions. Although speculation once suggested that they settled the Chatham Islands directly from the tropical Polynesian islands, current research indicates that ancestral Moriori were
Māori
Māori or Maori can refer to:
Relating to the Māori people
* Māori people of New Zealand, or members of that group
* Māori language, the language of the Māori people of New Zealand
* Māori culture
* Cook Islanders, the Māori people of the C ...
Polynesians who emigrated to the Chatham Islands from mainland New Zealand around 1500.
[
][
]
Evidence supporting this theory comes from the characteristics that the
Moriori language
Moriori is a Polynesian languages, Polynesian language most closely related to Māori language, New Zealand Māori and was spoken by the Moriori people, Moriori, the indigenous people of New Zealand's Chatham Islands (''Rēkohu'' in Moriori), a ...
has in common with the dialect of Māori spoken by the
Ngāi Tahu
Ngāi Tahu, or Kāi Tahu, is the principal Māori (tribe) of the South Island. Its (tribal area) is the largest in New Zealand, and extends from the White Bluffs / Te Parinui o Whiti (southeast of Blenheim), Mount Mahanga and Kahurangi Poi ...
tribe of the
South Island
The South Island, also officially named , is the larger of the two major islands of New Zealand in surface area, the other being the smaller but more populous North Island. It is bordered to the north by Cook Strait, to the west by the Tasman ...
, and comparisons of the genealogies of Moriori ("hokopapa") and Māori ("
whakapapa
Whakapapa (, ), or genealogy, is a fundamental principle in Māori culture. Reciting one's whakapapa proclaims one's Māori identity, places oneself in a wider context, and links oneself to land and tribal groupings and the mana of those.
Exper ...
"). Prevailing wind patterns in the southern Pacific add to the speculation that the Chatham Islands were the last part of the Pacific to be settled during the period of Polynesian discovery and colonisation.
The word ''Moriori'' derives from Proto-Polynesian , which has the reconstructed meaning "true, real, genuine". It is
cognate
In historical linguistics, cognates or lexical cognates are sets of words in different languages that have been inherited in direct descent from an etymology, etymological ancestor in a proto-language, common parent language. Because language c ...
with the
Māori language
Māori (), or ('the Māori language'), also known as ('the language'), is an Eastern Polynesian language spoken by the Māori people, the indigenous population of mainland New Zealand. Closely related to Cook Islands Māori, Tuamotuan, and ...
word
Māori
Māori or Maori can refer to:
Relating to the Māori people
* Māori people of New Zealand, or members of that group
* Māori language, the language of the Māori people of New Zealand
* Māori culture
* Cook Islanders, the Māori people of the C ...
[Polynesian Lexicon Project Online, entry *maqoli](_blank)
/ref> and likely also had the meaning "(ordinary) people".
Adapting to local conditions
The Chathams are colder and less hospitable than the land the original settlers left behind, and although abundant in resources, these were different from those available where they had come from. The Chathams proved unsuitable for the cultivation of most crops known to Polynesians, and the Moriori adopted a hunter-gatherer
A traditional hunter-gatherer or forager is a human living an ancestrally derived lifestyle in which most or all food is obtained by foraging, that is, by gathering food from local sources, especially edible wild plants but also insects, fungi, ...
lifestyle. Food was almost entirely marine-sourced — protein and fat from fish, fur seal
Fur seals are any of nine species of pinnipeds belonging to the subfamily Arctocephalinae in the family '' Otariidae''. They are much more closely related to sea lions than true seals, and share with them external ears (pinnae), relatively lon ...
s, and the fatty young of sea birds. The islands supported about 2,000 people.
Lacking resources of cultural significance such as greenstone and plentiful timber, they found outlets for their ritual needs in the carving of dendroglyph
Arborglyphs, dendroglyphs, silvaglyphs, or modified cultural trees are carvings of shapes and symbols into the bark of living trees. Although most often referring to ancient cultural practices, the term also refers to modern tree-carving.
Love ...
s (incisions into tree trunks, called ''rakau momori''). Typically, most Moriori dendroglyphs depict a human form but there are also other patterns depicting fish and birds. Some of these carvings are protected by the JM Barker (Hapupu) Historic Reserve.
As a small and precarious population, Moriori embraced a pacifist
Pacifism is the opposition or resistance to war, militarism (including conscription and mandatory military service) or violence. Pacifists generally reject theories of Just War. The word ''pacifism'' was coined by the French peace campaign ...
culture
Culture () is an umbrella term which encompasses the social behavior, institutions, and norms found in human societies, as well as the knowledge, beliefs, arts, laws, customs, capabilities, and habits of the individuals in these groups.Tyl ...
that rigidly avoided warfare, replacing it with dispute resolution in the form of ritual
A ritual is a sequence of activities involving gestures, words, actions, or objects, performed according to a set sequence. Rituals may be prescribed by the traditions of a community, including a religious community. Rituals are characterized, b ...
fighting and conciliation
Conciliation is an alternative dispute resolution (ADR) process whereby the parties to a dispute use a conciliator, who meets with the parties both separately and together in an attempt to resolve their differences. They do this by lowering te ...
. The ban on warfare and cannibalism is attributed to their ancestor Nunuku-whenua
Nunuku-whenua was a Moriori chief who is known for being a sixteenth-century pacifist.
The Moriori, a Polynesian people, migrated to the then-uninhabited Chatham Islands from mainland New Zealand around the year 1500. Following an intertribal con ...
.
This enabled the Moriori to preserve what limited resources they had in their harsh climate, avoiding waste through warfare. However, this lack of training in warfare also led to their later near-destruction at the hands of invading North Island Māori.
Moriori castrated some male infants in order to control population growth.
European contact (1791–1835)
The first Europeans to make contact with the Moriori were the crew of on 29 November 1791, while on its voyage to the northern Pacific from England, via Dusky Sound
Tamatea / Dusky Sound is a fiord on the southwest corner of New Zealand, in Fiordland National Park.
Geography
One of the most complex of the many fiords on this coast, it is also the largest at 40 kilometres in length and eight kilometr ...
. The ''Chatham's'' captain, William R. Broughton, named the islands after his ship and claimed them for Great Britain
Great Britain is an island in the North Atlantic Ocean off the northwest coast of continental Europe. With an area of , it is the largest of the British Isles, the largest European island and the ninth-largest island in the world. It is ...
. The landing party came to shore in Kaingaroa Harbour on the far Northeast coast of Chatham Island. The Moriori at first retreated into the forest once the Europeans landed. Seventy years later the Europeans would be recalled in Moriori oral tradition as containing the god of fire, given the pipes they were smoking and likely female from the clothes they were wearing. It was this interpretation that led to the men returning from the forest to meet the landing party. A brief period of hostility was quickly calmed by the crew putting gifts on the end of Moriori spears, though attempts at trade were unsuccessful. After exploring the area for water the crew again became fearful of Moriori aggression. Some misunderstanding led to an escalation of violence and one Moriori was shot and killed. HMS ''Chatham'' then left the island with all its crew. Both the diary of Broughton and local oral tradition record that both sides regretted the incident and to some extent blamed themselves for overreacting.
It was this regret in part that led to good relations when the next ships arrived in the islands sometime between 1804 and 1807. They were sealers Sealer may refer either to a person or ship engaged in seal hunting, or to a sealant; associated terms include:
Seal hunting
* Sealer Hill, South Shetland Islands, Antarctica
* Sealers' Oven, bread oven of mud and stone built by sealers around 180 ...
from Sydney and word of their welcome soon gave the Moriori a reputation of being friendly. During this time at least one Moriori visited the New Zealand mainland and returned home with knowledge of the Māori
Māori or Maori can refer to:
Relating to the Māori people
* Māori people of New Zealand, or members of that group
* Māori language, the language of the Māori people of New Zealand
* Māori culture
* Cook Islanders, the Māori people of the C ...
. As more ships came, sealing gangs were also left behind on the islands for months at a time. Sealers and whalers soon made the islands a centre of their activities, competing for resources with the native population. Pigs and potatoes were introduced to the islands. However, the seals that had religious significance and provided food and clothing to the Moriori were all but wiped out. European men intermarried with Moriori. Māori arrivals created their own village at Wharekauri which became the Māori name for the Chatham Islands.
The local population was estimated at about 1,600 in the mid-1830s with about 10% and 20% of the population having died from infectious diseases such as influenza. The effects of influenza were made more serious by the habit, also common to the Māori, of immersion in cold water.
Invasion by Taranaki Māori (1835–1868)
In 1835 some displaced Ngāti Mutunga
Ngāti Mutunga is a Māori iwi (tribe) of New Zealand, whose original tribal lands were in north Taranaki. They migrated from Taranaki, first to Wellington (with Ngāti Toa and other Taranaki Hāpu), and then to the Chatham Islands (along wit ...
and Ngāti Tama
Ngāti Tama is a historic Māori iwi of present-day New Zealand which whakapapas back to Tama Ariki, the chief navigator on the Tokomaru waka. The iwi of Ngati Tama is located in north Taranaki around Poutama. The Mōhakatino river marks the ...
, from the Taranaki
Taranaki is a region in the west of New Zealand's North Island. It is named after its main geographical feature, the stratovolcano of Mount Taranaki, also known as Mount Egmont.
The main centre is the city of New Plymouth. The New Plymouth Dist ...
region, but living in Wellington
Wellington ( mi, Te Whanganui-a-Tara or ) is the capital city of New Zealand. It is located at the south-western tip of the North Island, between Cook Strait and the Remutaka Range. Wellington is the second-largest city in New Zealand by me ...
, invaded the Chathams. On 19 November 1835, the brig ''Lord Rodney'', a hijacked European ship, arrived carrying 500 Māori (men, women and children) with guns, clubs and axes, and loaded with 78 tonnes of potatoes for planting, followed by another load, by the same ship, of 400 more Māori on 5 December 1835. Before the second shipment of people arrived, the invaders killed a 12-year-old girl and hung her flesh on posts. They proceeded to enslave some Moriori and kill and cannibalise others, committing a genocide. With the arrival of the second group "parties of warriors armed with muskets, clubs and tomahawks, led by their chiefs, walked through Moriori tribal territories and settlements without warning, permission or greeting. If the districts were wanted by the invaders, they curtly informed the inhabitants that their land had been taken and the Moriori living there were now vassals."
A ''hui
The Hui people ( zh, c=, p=Huízú, w=Hui2-tsu2, Xiao'erjing: , dng, Хуэйзў, ) are an East Asian ethnoreligious group predominantly composed of Chinese-speaking adherents of Islam. They are distributed throughout China, mainly in the n ...
'' or council of Moriori elders was convened at the settlement called Te Awapatiki. Despite knowing that the Māori did not share their pacifism, and despite the admonition by some of the elder chiefs that the principle of Nunuku was not appropriate now, two chiefs — Tapata and Torea — declared that "the law of Nunuku was not a strategy for survival, to be varied as conditions changed; it was a moral imperative." Although this council decided in favour of peace, the invading Māori inferred it was a prelude to war, as was common practice during the Musket Wars
The Musket Wars were a series of as many as 3,000 battles and raids fought throughout New Zealand (including the Chatham Islands) among Māori between 1807 and 1837, after Māori first obtained muskets and then engaged in an intertribal arms ra ...
. This precipitated a massacre, most complete in the Waitangi area followed by an enslavement
Slavery and enslavement are both the state and the condition of being a slave—someone forbidden to quit one's service for an enslaver, and who is treated by the enslaver as property. Slavery typically involves slaves being made to perf ...
of the Moriori survivors.
A Moriori survivor recalled : " he Māoricommenced to kill us like sheep.... ewere terrified, fled to the bush, concealed ourselves in holes underground, and in any place to escape our enemies. It was of no avail; we were discovered and killed – men, women and children indiscriminately." A Māori conqueror explained, "We took possession... in accordance with our customs and we caught all the people. Not one escaped....." The invaders ritually killed some 10% of the population, a ritual that included staking out women and children on the beach and leaving them to die in great pain over several days.
During the following enslavement the Māori invaders forbade the speaking of the Moriori language. They forced Moriori to desecrate their sacred sites by urinating and defecating on them.[King, M. ''The Silence Beyond''. Penguin, 2011 ; p. 190.] Moriori were forbidden to marry Moriori or Māori, or to have children with each other. This was different from the customary form of slavery
Slavery and enslavement are both the state and the condition of being a slave—someone forbidden to quit one's service for an enslaver, and who is treated by the enslaver as property. Slavery typically involves slaves being made to perf ...
practised on mainland New Zealand. However, many Moriori women had children by their Māori masters. A small number of Moriori women eventually married either Māori or European men. Some were taken from the Chathams and never returned. In 1842 a small party of Māori and their Moriori slaves migrated to the subantarctic Auckland Islands
The Auckland Islands (Māori: ''Motu Maha'' "Many islands" or ''Maungahuka'' "Snowy mountains") are an archipelago of New Zealand, lying south of the South Island. The main Auckland Island, occupying , is surrounded by smaller Adams Island, ...
, surviving for some 20 years on sealing and flax growing.[Murihiku timeline](_blank)
(Abandoned website)
at the Wayback Machine
The Wayback Machine is a digital archive of the World Wide Web founded by the Internet Archive, a nonprofit based in San Francisco, California. Created in 1996 and launched to the public in 2001, it allows the user to go "back in time" and see ...
. Only 101 Moriori out of a population of about 2,000 were left alive by 1862, making the Moriori genocide one of the deadliest in history by percentage of the victim group.
Dispersal and assimilation
The Moriori were free from slavery by the end of the 1860s which gave them opportunities for self determination, but their small population led to a gradual dilution of their culture. Only a handful of men still understood the Moriori language
Moriori is a Polynesian languages, Polynesian language most closely related to Māori language, New Zealand Māori and was spoken by the Moriori people, Moriori, the indigenous people of New Zealand's Chatham Islands (''Rēkohu'' in Moriori), a ...
and culture from before the invasion. The younger generation spoke Māori, while still identifying themselves as Moriori. While attempts were made to record the Moriori culture for posterity, it was generally believed that it would never again be a living way of life. By 1900 there would only be twelve people in the Chatham Islands who identified themselves as Moriori. Although the last Moriori of unmixed ancestry, Tommy Solomon, died in 1933, there are several thousand mixed ancestry Moriori alive today.
In the 2001 New Zealand census, 585 people identified as Moriori. The population increased to 942 in the 2006 census
6 (six) is the natural number following 5 and preceding 7. It is a composite number and the smallest perfect number.
In mathematics
Six is the smallest positive integer which is neither a square number nor a prime number; it is the second small ...
and declined to 738 in the 2013 census. The 2018 census estimated the Moriori population as 996.
Waitangi Tribunal claim
In the late 1980s some Moriori descendants made claims against the New Zealand government through the Waitangi Tribunal
The Waitangi Tribunal (Māori: ''Te Rōpū Whakamana i te Tiriti o Waitangi'') is a New Zealand permanent commission of inquiry established under the Treaty of Waitangi Act 1975. It is charged with investigating and making recommendations on cla ...
. The Tribunal is charged with making recommendations on claims brought by Māori relating to actions or omissions of the Crown
The Crown is the state in all its aspects within the jurisprudence of the Commonwealth realms and their subdivisions (such as the Crown Dependencies, overseas territories, provinces, or states). Legally ill-defined, the term has different ...
in the period since 1840, which breach the promises made in the Treaty of Waitangi
The Treaty of Waitangi ( mi, Te Tiriti o Waitangi) is a document of central importance to the history, to the political constitution of the state, and to the national mythos of New Zealand. It has played a major role in the treatment of the M ...
. These claims were the first time the Tribunal had to choose between competing claims of two indigenous groups. The main focus of the claim was the British annexation of the islands in 1842, the inaction of the Government to reports of Moriori being kept in slavery and the awarding of 97% of the islands to Ngati Mutunga
''Ngati'' is a 1987 New Zealand feature film directed by Barry Barclay, written by Tama Poata and produced by John O'Shea (director), John O'Shea.
Production
''Ngati'' is of historical and cultural significance in New Zealand as it is the first ...
in 1870 by the Native Land Court
Native may refer to:
People
* Jus soli, citizenship by right of birth
* Indigenous peoples, peoples with a set of specific rights based on their historical ties to a particular territory
** Native Americans (disambiguation)
In arts and enterta ...
.
In 1992, while the Moriori claim was active, the Sealords fisheries deal ceded a third of New Zealand's fisheries to Māori, but prevented any further treaty fishery claims. This occurred against the backdrop of Māori, Moriori and Pākehā
Pākehā (or Pakeha; ; ) is a Māori term for New Zealanders primarily of European descent. Pākehā is not a legal concept and has no definition under New Zealand law. The term can apply to fair-skinned persons, or to any non-Māori New Ze ...
Chatham Islanders all competing for fishing rights, while working together to exclude international and mainland interests. Therefore, it was believed that the result of the Tribunals verdict on the ownership of the Chatham Islands may improve the Moriori ability to acquire some of the allotted fishing rights from the Sealords deal. The Moriori claims were heard between May 1994 and March 1996 and the verdict was strongly in favour of the Moriori case.
This in turn led to an NZ$18 million deal between the Crown and Moriori in 2017. The Crown and Moriori subsequently signed a Deed of Settlement on 13 August 2019. In November 2021, the New Zealand Parliament passed the Moriori Claims Settlement Bill, which completed the Treaty of Waitangi
The Treaty of Waitangi ( mi, Te Tiriti o Waitangi) is a document of central importance to the history, to the political constitution of the state, and to the national mythos of New Zealand. It has played a major role in the treatment of the M ...
process of the Moriori. Under the terms of the legislation, the settlement package includes a formal Crown apology, the transfer of culturally and spiritually significant lands to Moriori as cultural redress, financial compensation of NZ$18 million, and shared redress such as the vesting of 50 percent of Te Whanga Lagoon
Te Whanga Lagoon dominates the geography of Chatham Island, in the South Pacific Ocean off New Zealand's east coast. It covers .
It is the outflow of several small rivers in the island's hilly south, and drains to the Pacific via gaps in Hanson ...
.
Culture and marae
Today, despite the difficulties that the Moriori have faced, their culture is enjoying a renaissance, both in the Chatham Islands and New Zealand's mainland. This has been symbolised with the renewal of the Covenant of Peace at the new Kōpinga marae
A ' (in New Zealand Māori, Cook Islands Māori, Tahitian), ' (in Tongan), ' (in Marquesan) or ' (in Samoan) is a communal or sacred place that serves religious and social purposes in Polynesian societies. In all these languages, the term a ...
in January 2005 on Chatham Island. As of 2016, the marae has registered almost 800 Moriori descendants, with more than 3000 associated children. The Kopinga meeting place and Hokomenetai meeting house are based in the town of Waitangi, also on Chatham Island.
In 2001 work began on preserving the vocabulary and songs of the Moriori people. They also received a $6 million grant from the Government to preserve their culture and language. The albatross remains important in Moriori culture: it is seen in the design of the Kōpinga marae
A ' (in New Zealand Māori, Cook Islands Māori, Tahitian), ' (in Tongan), ' (in Marquesan) or ' (in Samoan) is a communal or sacred place that serves religious and social purposes in Polynesian societies. In all these languages, the term a ...
and its feathers are worn in the hair of some Moriori as a sign of peace. The relationship between the Moriori and Ngati Mutunga is improving, and non-violence remains a cornerstone of the Moriori self image.
In 2002 land on the east coast of Chatham Island was purchased by the Crown (the Taia property). It is now a reserve and jointly managed by Moriori and the Crown. The Moriori are also actively involved with preserving the ''rakau momori'' (tree carvings) on the islands.
Language
English and to a lesser extent Māori are spoken by Moriori today. The now extinct Moriori language
Moriori is a Polynesian languages, Polynesian language most closely related to Māori language, New Zealand Māori and was spoken by the Moriori people, Moriori, the indigenous people of New Zealand's Chatham Islands (''Rēkohu'' in Moriori), a ...
was Eastern Polynesian and closely related to Māori
Māori or Maori can refer to:
Relating to the Māori people
* Māori people of New Zealand, or members of that group
* Māori language, the language of the Māori people of New Zealand
* Māori culture
* Cook Islanders, the Māori people of the C ...
and Cook Island Māori
Cook or The Cook may refer to:
Food preparation
* Cooking, the preparation of food
* Cook (domestic worker), a household staff member who prepares food
* Cook (professional), an individual who prepares food for consumption in the food industry
* ...
with which it was mutually intelligible. It shared about 70% of its vocabulary with Māori; however, there were significant differences in grammar and pronunciation. There are modern attempts at creating learning materials to ensure the survival of what remains of the language.
Political organisation
In 2001 the two main political groups of Moriori united to form the Hokotehi Moriori Trust; however, some internal disputes remain. The New Zealand Government
, background_color = #012169
, image = New Zealand Government wordmark.svg
, image_size=250px
, date_established =
, country = New Zealand
, leader_title = Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern
, appointed = Governor-General
, main_organ =
, ...
recognises the Hokotehi Moriori Trust as having the mandate to represent Moriori in Treaty of Waitangi
The Treaty of Waitangi ( mi, Te Tiriti o Waitangi) is a document of central importance to the history, to the political constitution of the state, and to the national mythos of New Zealand. It has played a major role in the treatment of the M ...
settlement negotiations. It is also a mandated iwi
Iwi () are the largest social units in New Zealand Māori society. In Māori roughly means "people" or "nation", and is often translated as "tribe", or "a confederation of tribes". The word is both singular and plural in the Māori language, an ...
organisation under the Māori Fisheries Act 2004 and a recognised iwi aquaculture organisation in the Māori Commercial Aquaculture Claims Settlement Act 2004. The trust represents Moriori as an "iwi authority" for resource consents under the Resource Management Act 1991
The Resource Management Act (RMA) passed in 1991 in New Zealand is a significant, and at times, controversial Act of Parliament. The RMA promotes the sustainable management of natural and physical resources such as land, air and water. New Zea ...
, and is a Tūhono
Tūhono is an advocacy network for Māori groups and individuals within New Zealand.
As well as forming a network linking different iwi and hapū, Tūhono aims to promote cultural and spiritual wellbeing and benefit to the Māori community and al ...
organisation. The charitable trust is managed by ten trustees, with representation from both the Chatham Islands
The Chatham Islands ( ) (Moriori: ''Rēkohu'', 'Misty Sun'; mi, Wharekauri) are an archipelago in the Pacific Ocean about east of New Zealand's South Island. They are administered as part of New Zealand. The archipelago consists of about te ...
, and the North Island
The North Island, also officially named Te Ika-a-Māui, is one of the two main islands of New Zealand, separated from the larger but much less populous South Island by the Cook Strait. The island's area is , making it the world's 14th-largest ...
and South Island
The South Island, also officially named , is the larger of the two major islands of New Zealand in surface area, the other being the smaller but more populous North Island. It is bordered to the north by Cook Strait, to the west by the Tasman ...
. It is based at Owenga on Chatham Island.
The Moriori in popular culture
Based on the writing of Percy Smith and Elsdon Best
Elsdon Best (30 June 1856 – 9 September 1931) was an ethnographer who made important contributions to the study of the Māori of New Zealand.
Early years
Elsdon Best was born 30 June 1856 at Tawa Flat, New Zealand, to William Best and the fo ...
from the late 19th century, theories grew up that the Māori had displaced a more primitive pre-Māori population of Moriori (sometimes described as a small-statured, dark-skinned race of possible Melanesia
Melanesia (, ) is a subregion of Oceania in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. It extends from Indonesia's New Guinea in the west to Fiji in the east, and includes the Arafura Sea.
The region includes the four independent countries of Fiji, Va ...
n origin), in mainland New Zealand – and that the Chatham Island
Chatham Island ( ) (Moriori: ''Rēkohu'', 'Misty Sun'; mi, Wharekauri) is by far the largest island of the Chatham Islands group, in the south Pacific Ocean off the eastern coast of New Zealand's South Island. It is said to be "halfway bet ...
Moriori were the last remnant of this earlier race. These theories also favoured the supposedly more recent and more technically able Māori. This was used to justify racist
Racism is the belief that groups of humans possess different behavioral traits corresponding to inherited attributes and can be divided based on the superiority of one race over another. It may also mean prejudice, discrimination, or antagonism ...
stereotyping
In social psychology, a stereotype is a generalized belief about a particular category of people. It is an expectation that people might have about every person of a particular group. The type of expectation can vary; it can be, for example ...
, colonisation
Colonization, or colonisation, constitutes large-scale population movements wherein migrants maintain strong links with their, or their ancestors', former country – by such links, gain advantage over other inhabitants of the territory. When ...
, and conquest by cultural "superiors". and – from the view of European settlers – of undermining the notion of the Māori as the indigenous people of New Zealand, making them just one in a progression of waves of migration and conquest by increasingly more civilised people.
The hypothesis of a racially distinct pre-Māori Moriori people was criticised in the 20th century by a number of historians, anthropologists and ethnologists; among them anthropologist H. D. Skinner in 1923, ethnologist Roger Duff in the 1940s, historian and ethnographer Arthur Thomson in 1959, as well as Michael King in ''Moriori: A People Rediscovered'' in 2000, James Belich in 2002, and K. R. Howe in '' Te Ara: The Encyclopedia of New Zealand''.
The idea of Moriori arriving earlier and being vastly distinct from Māori was widely published in the early 20th century.[See for example: .] Crucially, this story was also promoted in a series of three articles in the ''New Zealand School Journal
The ''New Zealand School Journal'' is a periodical children's educational publication in New Zealand. Founded in 1907 by the Department of Education, it is one of the world's longest-running publications for children. Since 2013 it has been pub ...
'' of 1916, and the 1934 A. W. Reed schoolbook ''The Coming of the Maori to Ao-tea-roa''—and therefore became familiar to generations of schoolchildren. This in turn has been repeated by the media and politicians. However, at no point has this idea completely dominated the discussion, with the academic consensus slowly gaining more public awareness over the 20th century.
The 2004 David Mitchell novel ''Cloud Atlas
A cloud atlas is a pictorial key (or an atlas) to the nomenclature of clouds. Early cloud atlases were an important element in the training of meteorologists and in weather forecasting, and the author of a 1923 atlas stated that "increasing use ...
'', and its 2012 film adaption both featured the enslavement of Moriori by the Maori on the Chatham Islands in the mid-19th century. Scholar Gabriel S. Estrada criticised the depiction of Maori slave culture as being incorrectly depicted in a similar manner to slavery in the United States
The legal institution of human chattel slavery, comprising the enslavement primarily of Africans and African Americans, was prevalent in the United States of America from its founding in 1776 until 1865, predominantly in the South. Sl ...
, featuring enslaved Moriori working on plantation
A plantation is an agricultural estate, generally centered on a plantation house, meant for farming that specializes in cash crops, usually mainly planted with a single crop, with perhaps ancillary areas for vegetables for eating and so on. The ...
s similar to those in the American South
The Southern United States (sometimes Dixie, also referred to as the Southern States, the American South, the Southland, or simply the South) is a geographic and cultural region of the United States of America. It is between the Atlantic Ocean ...
. The interchangeability of these two practices has been noted by historians as being a common misconception in popular culture.
See also
* Chatham Islands
The Chatham Islands ( ) (Moriori: ''Rēkohu'', 'Misty Sun'; mi, Wharekauri) are an archipelago in the Pacific Ocean about east of New Zealand's South Island. They are administered as part of New Zealand. The archipelago consists of about te ...
*Moriori language
Moriori is a Polynesian languages, Polynesian language most closely related to Māori language, New Zealand Māori and was spoken by the Moriori people, Moriori, the indigenous people of New Zealand's Chatham Islands (''Rēkohu'' in Moriori), a ...
Notable Moriori
* Joey Matenga Ashton
*Nunuku-whenua
Nunuku-whenua was a Moriori chief who is known for being a sixteenth-century pacifist.
The Moriori, a Polynesian people, migrated to the then-uninhabited Chatham Islands from mainland New Zealand around the year 1500. Following an intertribal con ...
* Kiti Karaka Riwai
* Tommy Solomon
* Hirawanu Tapu
Hirawanu Tapu ( 1824–1900) was a notable New Zealand Moriori leader. He was born in Te Awapatiki, Chatham Islands, New Zealand. He was a major source for Alexander Shand's works on Moriori history, traditions, chants and vocabulary
A v ...
* Torotoro
References
Sources
*
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Further reading
*
External links
Moriori Claims Settlement Bill
(Agreed Legal Account of Moriori History, noting Moriori to have arrived between 1000 and 1400 CE – not 1500AD)
Hokotehi Moriori Trust
(Official Website)
Rekohu: Report on Moriori and Ngāti Mutunga Claims in the Chatham Islands
Moriori Education Resources
(Official Website)
IPinCH Moriori database
{{DEFAULTSORT:Moriori People
Society of New Zealand
New Zealand pacifists
Ethnic groups in New Zealand
1835 in New Zealand
Indigenous peoples of Polynesia