Best. — Notes on Ancient Polynesian Migrants. 121 



Art. II. — Notes on Ancient Polynesian Migrants, or Voyagers, to 

 New Zealand, and Voyage of the " Aratawhao " Canoe to 

 Hawaiki. 



By Elsdon Best. 

 [Read before the Auckland Institute, \2th September, 1904.] 

 In regard to the peopling of New Zealand by the Polynesian 

 race, that event is usually referred to the fleet of canoes which 

 arrived on these shores about twenty generations ago, simply 

 because that migration is the only one of which any clear and 

 connected account has been retained by the natives. The reason 

 of this is probably because the people who came on board the 

 " Arawa," " Tainui," " Matatua," " Aotea," and " Kurahaupo " 

 vessels were of a more vigorous, warlike, and aggressive nature 

 than the old-time people of these isles, a prior migration, 

 or migrations, of Polynesians whom the newcomers found in 

 possession of this country. The latter people intermarried with 

 the original settlers, and, when they acquired strength of numbers, 

 often fought them, and by these two modes of procedure became 

 the dominant people of the land. Judging from information 

 obtained from the descendants of the so-called autochthones, 

 it would appear that the original people were of by no means 

 a warlike nature. Hence, as time passed on, the power and 

 prestige of the latter migration waxed ever greater, while that 

 of the first-comers waned in proportion. Even so, we can acquire 

 but little information as to the origin or whence of the first 

 settlers in these isles ; in some cases they have not retained even 

 the name of the vessel by which their ancestors reached these 

 shores. In such plight is the Tuhoe, or Urewera, Tribe, who 

 cannot now give a satisfactory account of the origin of their 

 main line of descent — viz., that through Potiki, from whom 

 this ancient people derive their old-time tribal name, for Tuhoe 

 and Te Urewera are but modern names. This tribe is in part 

 descended from the people who came in the " Horouta," " Otu- 

 rereao," ; ' Rangimatoru," and '' Nukutere " vessels, albeit they 

 can give but a very meagre account of those little-known canoes. 

 The fact is that these original people of the land have been here 

 so long that they have lost any connected or clear account of 

 their origin which they may have retained in past centuries. 



I will now give some account of two lines of descent by which 

 the original people of the Bay of Plenty district trace their origin 

 from the two ancient canoes " Te Aratauwhaiti " and " Rangi- 

 matoru." 



