Māori visit Sydney and London
New Zealand did not have even a nominal city until 1856, when Christchurch achieved city status. (Its population was only a few thousand.) By then, Sydney and London were well established as important cities for New Zealand.
Sydney – known to Māori as Poihākena (Port Jackson) – was a major trading centre and the port through which New Zealand accessed British goods and services, government officials and missionaries. London – Rānana – was the home of the British royal family and the political and cultural centre of the British Empire. Sydney and London were the two urban areas Māori travellers visited most frequently from the late 18th century. Both cities now have long histories of Māori visiting and relocating to them.
Māori and Sydney
From the late 18th century Māori travelled the world, often as crew on board ships. From the beginning of the 19th century Māori sought opportunities to trade with Sydney, and acquire new technologies and skills such as carpentry and gardening. Sydney was also the place where individual Māori met with British officials and missionaries. In 1804, for instance, Te Pahi, a chief of Rangihoua in the Bay of Islands, sent his son Maatara to Sydney to observe the British. The governor of New South Wales, Philip Gidley King, looked after Maatara and sent him home with tools and other gifts. In 1805 Te Pahi himself went to Sydney, where he stayed with King for several months. With his companions he learnt carpentry, gardening, weaving and spinning.
In 1805 another northern chief, Ruatara, set out to see the world. Working on whaling and sealing ships, he visited Sydney twice and in 1809 reached London but was not allowed ashore. After returning to Sydney in 1810, he stayed with the missionary Samuel Marsden at Parramatta for eight months. He did not return home to the Bay of Islands until 1812. Ruatara’s travels as a crew member were more fortunate than those of a Māori sailor on board the Atlantic, who was killed by lightning in Sydney Harbour in 1806.
In Sydney, Ruatara acquired eight muskets and borrowed a couple of pistols. Though significant at the time, his armoury would soon be outdone by Ngāpuhi chief Hongi Hika, who traded gifts he received in London for muskets, which were selling cheaply after being dumped on the Sydney market.
By the 1810s the Māori language could be heard on Sydney’s docks. By the 1840s an estimated 1,000 Māori had travelled overseas, with the majority going to Sydney, where their presence had become so common that it was no longer recorded. Sydney has remained an important city for Māori. By the early 21st century many Māori had migrated there, and Māori cultural activities and media thrived.
Fourth estate
In 1859 two Waikato Māori, Wiremu Toetoe and Hemara Te Rerehau, travelled to Austria on the frigate Novara, and were trained in printing techniques at the state printing house in Vienna. As a parting gift, in May 1860 Archduke Maximilian gave them a printing press, which was shipped to Ngāruawāhia. Late in 1861 the press was used to print a newspaper, Te Hokioi e Rere Atu Na, which was a mouthpiece for the Kingitanga, the Māori King movement. The young chiefs’ plan to import a lion was unsuccessful. During the Waikato War the press was broken up by troops.
Māori in London
One of the first Māori to visit London was Moehanga of Ngāpuhi, in 1806. He was presented to King George III. Hongi Hika visited London in 1820 with another Ngāpuhi chief, Waikato and missionary Thomas Kendall. They helped with the compilation of a Māori alphabet and grammar, and Hongi met King George IV.
In 1846–47, Hoani Wiremu Hīpango helped protect the new town of Whanganui from attack by another iwi. Partly because of this, Hīpango accompanied missionary Richard Taylor on a visit to England in 1855. When he arrived in London, Hīpango had an audience with Queen Victoria and Prince Albert. Other Māori reported in London included Māui, or Tommy Drummond, who taught Sunday school ithere in 1816, and Tuai and Titeri, who visited in 1818. In 1863 there were two Māori performing groups in London at the same time.
For Māori, London was the cultural centre of the British Empire, and also the home of the queen, their partner in the Treaty of Waitangi. Māori visiting London hoped to, and often did, meet royalty.
London and Māori culture
When members of the British royal family have visited Rotorua, they have participated in a Māori cultural experience. In 1959 Māori in London set up the cultural group Ngāti Rānana (the London tribe). In the early 21st century, Ngāti Rānana was a thriving kapa haka group.