South Cape / Whiore is a

cape A cape is a clothing accessory or a sleeveless outer garment which drapes the wearer's back, arms, and chest, and connects at the neck. History Capes were common in medieval Europe, especially when combined with a hood in the chaperon. Th ...

marking the southernmost point of

Stewart Island / Rakiura Stewart Island ( mi, Rakiura, ' glowing skies', officially Stewart Island / Rakiura) is New Zealand's third-largest island, located south of the South Island, across the Foveaux Strait. It is a roughly triangular island with a total land ar ...

, and by extension the main

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 ...

archipelago. It is one of the four Cardinal Capes of New Zealand identified by Captain

James Cook James Cook (7 November 1728 Old Style date: 27 October – 14 February 1779) was a British explorer, navigator, cartographer, and captain in the British Royal Navy, famous for his three voyages between 1768 and 1779 in the Pacific Ocean an ...

on his first voyage, along with North Cape, Cape East and

West Cape West Cape is the westernmost point in the main chain of islands of New Zealand. It is located in the far southwest of the South Island, within Fiordland National Park, between Tamatea / Dusky Sound and Taiari / Chalky Inlet. The cape consists of a ...

. Cook originally named the place "Cape South". At the time, Cook incorrectly charted the island as a peninsula attached to 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 ...

of New Zealand, with a narrow isthmus in place of

Foveaux Strait The Foveaux Strait, (, or , ) separates Stewart Island, New Zealand's third largest island, from the South Island. The strait is about 130 km long (from Ruapuke Island to Little Solander Island), and it widens (from 14 km at Ruapuk ...

. South Cape is also one of the world's five

Great Capes In sailing, the great capes are three major capes of the continents in the Southern Ocean—Africa's Cape of Good Hope, Australia's Cape Leeuwin, and South America's Cape Horn. Sailing The traditional clipper route followed the winds of the ro ...

, along with capes in South America, Africa, and Australia. In 1998, South Cape became one of 90 place names to be given a

dual name Dual naming is the adoption of an official place name that combines two earlier names, or uses both names, often to resolve a disagreement over which of the two individual names is more appropriate. In some cases, the reasons are political. Some ...

with the passage of the

Ngāi Tahu Claims Settlement Act 1998 The Ngāi Tahu Claims Settlement Act 1998 is an act of Parliament passed in New Zealand relating to Ngāi Tahu, the principal Māori (tribe) of the South Island. It was negotiated in part by Henare Rakiihia Tau. The documents in relation to the ...

, representing part of a settlement of claims made against the New Zealand government 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 ...

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 ...

for breaches of 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 ...

. The new name, South Cape / Whiore, includes a traditional

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 ...

name for the Cape alongside the name given to it by Cook.

References

''The Circumnavigation of New Zealand''
from The Captain Cook Society

* ttp://www.joshuaslocumsocietyintl.org/awards.htm ''Slocum Awards: Golden Circle Award'' from the Joshua Slocum Society International Headlands of Southland, New Zealand Landforms of Stewart Island {{Southland-geo-stub

See also

References