`Pushing history back beyond our real time’ – original article appeared in Sunday Star-Times, April 1998

`Archaeological researchers are throwing new light on the age-old questions: Who got here first?’

A court case in the South Island which sees the Waitaha tribe seeking a judicial review to have its name removed from the Ngai Tahu settlement legislation is yet another step in an issue that has been simmering for many years: Just who were the first people to settle this country?

The answer might be a lot more complex and intriguing than once believed.

The Waitaha say they occupied the South Island long before Ngai Tahu came on the scene and they do not want to be included or receive money in the Ngai Tahu settlement as they are a separate tribe. Waitaha leader Rangimarie Te Maiharaoa says the settlement will “extinguish customary rights and aboriginal title of our people”.

In a not dissimilar case in 1994 Chatham Island Moriori put forward a claim for land, fisheries and official recognition as a first people, saying they were overrun by Taranaki Maori in 1835 and, as a result of their non-violent stance, ended up being enslaved or killed.

Moriori spokesman Maui Soloman said the crown had broken its obligation under the Treaty of Waitangi by not ensuring the court took into account Moriori tradition and perpetrating Victorian myths about the origins and nature of Moriori society.

Now a growing body of evidence from the divergent fields of science, history, archaeology and oral genealogical information is showing the human history of the first people of New Zealand stretches far further back than the great canoe migration from the Pacific around 1350AD.

Ten years ago Auckland University archaeologist Doug Sutton was among the first to claim human were here up to 2000 yeas ago. He based this on evidence of burn-offs and unexplained soil erosion, and sand dune movement. At the time his claims were largely dismissed.

But the subject got more attention in late 1996 when Christchurch scientist Dr Richard Holdaway carbon dated bones of a Polynesian rat (kiore) he had found in a Takaka cave that showed humans were probably here 1200 years earlier than previously thought.

Dr Holdaway, whose findings were published in the scientific journal Nature, says the rats could not have arrived here without people. His radio carbon dating has been verified by experts both here and overseas.

Just last month the theory was further advanced when bones believed to be from the extinct Finsche’s duck were found in Hawke’s Bay. What makes them so pertinent is that they are encased in volcanic ash (ignimbrite) from the massive Taupo eruption of 232AD. If radio carbon dating of the bones matched the date of the Taupo eruption any arguments on the accuracy of such dating of small birds and rats is over.

Then there is the intriguing case of an ancient carving now being held at the Dargaville Maritime Museum in Northland. The carving – kept secret since its discovery six years ago – was first announced to the public early in 1997 after being restored at Auckland University.

Museum curator and renowned historian Noel Hilliam says the rare 2.7m female carving is Waitaha and was found in sand dunes at North Head on Kaipara Harbour by a local woman.

There is also much talk in the area about a buried first people Waitaha village in the Kaipara dunes that first made an appearance several years ago when a fierce storm temporarily shifted sand. There are plans to raise the finance needed to excavate the site.

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No less than five people are writing books about our lost history. The work includes that of Australian Alan Seath, a specialist in archeoastronomy, who says huge stoneworks and modified hills here indicate an ancient civilisation was once adept at reading the movement of stars.

Napier author John Tasker has spent several years researching and writing his book Myth and Mystery (published late last year) which raised questions about Portuguese visitors to New Zealand.

Some of the most fascinating research is being compiled by journalist Gary Cook, who for the past three years has been extensively investigating, photographing and recording stone megaliths, domes, observatories and ritual burial sites with his small team.

Mr Cook says he has seen much work and art forms that are not of Maori origin. One of his biggest finds was in Waipoua Forest in Northland, which he says is a treasure trove of pre-Maori stone structures. What makes them intriguing is that the area was subject to a three-year $500,000 survey by the Forest Service (now DoC) in the mid-80s.

A 75-year embargo until 2063 was placed on the release of 300 pages of documents on the site. Although Mr Cook was able to get some material released through the Official Information Act, what still eludes him is information on radio carbon dating of up to 16 sites in a 242 ha area with nearly 2000 stones structures. His book, The Secret Land, is to be published early next year.

Another pondering the puzzle is Australian historian and author Rex Gilroy, who maintains Stone Age first people races preceded the Aborigines in Australia and the Polynesians in the Pacific. He says a ghostly trial of steeped pyramids and other stone structures point to Phoenician, Egyptian and Libyan relics.

Other important information comes from Christchurch historian and archaeologist Barry Brailsford. A highly credible source – he was principal lecturer at the Christchurch College of Education, has served at government level overseas and in 1990 was awarded an MBE for services to education and Maori scholarship – his story takes some beating.

He says he was approached in the late `80s by Waitaha elders and asked to write down what, until then, had been the oral and highly secret history of their people. The Waitaha knowledge he uncovered adds 1000 years to documented New Zealand history and takes occupation by first people back to the time of Christ.

Mr Brailsford say the Waitaha comprised of 200 iwi who came together in New Zealand from homelands in the Pacific. For about 200 years they made regular forays here, each time leaving small groups to settle. They eventually sent a founding waka of 175 people.

However, when elders foresaw the destruction of their peace-loving nation by later arrivals of warriors from the Pacific, whole generation of their genealogy were “erased” – the knowledge was not shared outside the Waitaha to protect the sacredness of their ancestors from violence and warfare.

Mr Brailsford says this had the effect of removing stepping-stones across a stream. Real knowledge of the Waitaha was kept alive in an oral tradition entrusted to a handful of people. The revelation adds a further 76 generations to the history of this country, he says.

What is most incredible are Mr Brailsford's claims the Waitaha comprised three different peoples: The Moriori, who at the time were giants, over 1.8m and superb gardeners, able to grow the kumara 1000km further south than in its South American homeland; the Urukehu, a fair-skinned people also known as the Starwalkers who were skilled at reading the geometry of the stars and were the navigators guiding the people to this land; and the Kiritea or Stone people, who came from Asian lands (Mr Brailsford says you can see depiction of them on some maraes where all the ancestors are shown) and who carried the greenstone over mountain passes.

Waitaha elders decided to release the information of their true past in line with an ancient prophesy (which was fulfilled by a special alignment of stars in 1990) and to offer hope to the young people of this land, says Mr Brailsford.

His journey in writing Song of Waitaha, released with great ceremony in 1994, has been extraordinary. Before beginning work on the book he had to lead a selected team of people across the Southern Alps to reopen old Waitaha greenstone rails closed for 130 years.

He had to undertake journeys which took him into the North American desert to light “trail fires” (which resulted in Wallace Black Elk, leader of the Sioux people, turning up unexpectedly on Mr Brailsford's Christchurch doorstep) and, on another journey, deliver greenstone to the 12 American Indian nations. He also visited megalithic sites in England, Scotland and Wales.