Manuel José de Frutos-Huerta (1811–1873) was a New Zealand trader. A Spaniard from

Valverde del Majano Valverde del Majano is a municipality located in the Segovia (province), province of Segovia, Castile and León, Spain. According to the 2004 census (Instituto Nacional de Estadística (Spain), INE), the municipality has a population of 561 inha ...

Segovia Segovia ( , , ) is a city in the autonomous community of Castile and León, Spain. It is the capital and most populated municipality of the Province of Segovia. Segovia is in the Inner Plateau ('' Meseta central''), near the northern slopes of t ...

, he arrived to New Zealand around 1833 and lived much of his life as a trader among the

Māori people The Māori (, ) are the indigenous Polynesian people of mainland New Zealand (). Māori originated with settlers from East Polynesia, who arrived in New Zealand in several waves of canoe voyages between roughly 1320 and 1350. Over several c ...

; he is described possessing Germanic features: pale skin, red hair, and green eyes. He retired to Tikapa on the

Waiapu River The Waiapu River is a river in the Gisborne District of the North Island of New Zealand, with a total length of approximately . Found in the north-east of the Waiapu Valley, it flows north-east from the joining of the Mata River and the Tapuaer ...

. He was married to five

Ngāti Porou Ngāti Porou is a Māori iwi traditionally located in the East Cape and Gisborne regions of the North Island of New Zealand. Ngāti Porou is affiliated with the 28th Maori Battalion and has the second-largest affiliation of any iwi in New Zeala ...

women, and has thousands of living descendants. The 2014 play "Paniora" by

Briar Grace-Smith Briar Grace-Smith is a screenwriter, director, actor, and short story writer from New Zealand. She has worked as an actor and writer with the Maori theatre cooperative Te Ohu Whakaari and Maori theatre company He Ara Hou. Early plays ''Don't Ca ...

was inspired by his legacy."Theatre and dance meet in magical tale of Maori and Spanish culture"
Dionne Christian, Mar 22, 2014, NZ Herald

References

External links

*
Otros documentales - El clan español de Nueva Zelanda
' . Documentary hosted by

RTVE The Corporación de Radio y Televisión Española, S.A. (; ), known as Radiotelevisión Española or RTVE, is the state-owned public corporation that assumed in 2007 the indirect management of the Spanish public radio and television service know ...

. 1873 deaths People from Segovia New Zealand traders Spanish emigrants to New Zealand 1811 births {{NewZealand-bio-stub