Taranaki
Where the wars of the 1860s began at Waitara, and where Parihaka's campaign of non-violent resistance was broken by invasion in 1881. The mountain has been at the centre of both.
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5 events in Taranaki between 1859 and 1881
The Waitara purchase is disputed
Governor Gore Browne accepted a junior chief’s offer to sell land at Waitara over the veto of the senior rangatira, Wiremu Kīngi Te Rangitāke.
WaitaraFirst Taranaki War
British artillery opened on Te Kōhia pā, beginning a year of fighting over the Waitara purchase that ended in an inconclusive truce.
Te Kōhia pā, WaitaraPai Mārire spreads
Te Ua Haumēne’s faith, blending Christian and Māori belief, spread from Taranaki across the North Island and was met with force by the Crown.
TaranakiTītokowaru’s campaign
Riwha Tītokowaru won a run of victories with a tiny force and had the colonial government close to losing the southern North Island, then his support evaporated.
South TaranakiThe invasion of Parihaka
Te pāhuatanga o Parihaka
Some 1,600 troops marched on a village that met them with singing children and offered loaves of bread. Te Whiti and Tohu were arrested, the settlement destroyed, and no one resisted.
ParihakaMeanwhile, nationally
11 events that reached Taranaki along with most of the country. They still shade the map and sit on the timeline above, but they are not Taranaki’s own history.
The Musket Wars
Musket-armed war parties reshaped the map of Māori New Zealand. Perhaps 20,000 died and whole districts changed hands before the fighting burned out around 1840.
New Zealand Constitution Act
Representative government arrived, divided into six provinces — and the property franchise excluded almost all Māori, who held land communally.
New Zealand Settlements Act — raupatu
Te raupatu whenua
The Crown took roughly 1.2 million hectares from iwi deemed to be in rebellion — including from communities that had never fought.
The Native Land Court is established
The court converted customary communal title into individual freehold — the mechanism by which most remaining Māori land was lost, without a shot fired.
The provinces are abolished
Nine provincial governments were swept away and replaced by central government plus counties and boroughs — the shape of local government for the next century.
First refrigerated cargo sails for London
The Dunedin left Port Chalmers with 4,900 frozen carcasses and arrived in London 98 days later with the cargo sound. It changed the country’s economy permanently.
Port ChalmersTohunga Suppression Act
An Act making it an offence to practise as a tohunga, aimed at prophets and healers whose authority the state saw as a threat to assimilation.
New Zealand enters the First World War
About 100,000 served overseas from a population of just over a million. Around 18,000 died and 41,000 were wounded — proportionally among the heaviest losses of any country.
New Zealand declares war on Germany
‘Where she goes, we go’ — 140,000 served overseas and nearly 12,000 died, from a population of 1.6 million.
Britain joins the EEC
New Zealand’s guaranteed British market for lamb, butter and cheese began closing after ninety years. The economy has never worked the same way since.
Waitangi Tribunal jurisdiction backdated to 1840
The single amendment that made Treaty settlements possible: the Tribunal could now investigate Crown breaches all the way back to 1840.