Unearthing New Zealand

GP Books, 1989. Minor wear to dustwrapper.

ln the last 25 years archaeological research in New Zealand has undergone something of a revolution. Using new techniques and drawing on a wide range of disciplines, archaeologists are now piecing together a new and far more complex picture of the human occupation of this country over the last 1000 years. Until then it was popularly believed that New Zealand had in the past been settled by two waves of non-European colonisers. lt was commonly thought that the 'Maoris', the Polynesians who inhabited the country at the time of Cook, had been preceded by a darker, possibly Melanesian and more primitive race called 'Morioris'. They had been supplanted by the Maoris who had arrived in a 'Great Fleet' from their ancestral homeland of Hawaiki some time in the fourteenth century. Today we know this version of events to be wrong - a myth promulgated by Pakeha researchers at the beginning of this century. lnstead, we now realise that this country was probably first settled by Polynesians about 1000 years ago. From this founding population of possibly only a handful of settlers emerged the Maoris - first as moa hunters, essentially itinerant hunters and gatherers whose impact on the new land was to have far-reaching effects. By 500 years ago the changed environment had forced changes upon their economy and lifestyle in favour of more permanent settlements based around a largely agricultural economy. Gradually the classic, and familiar, Maori culture emerged to be altered and submerged in its turn by the arrivai of Europeans 200 years ago. Unearthing New Zealand tells the fascinating story of this country's unique prehistory, reconstructing from archaeological evidence a sometimes extraordinarily complete picture of how these people lived and died. lts emphasis on social aspects - food and clothing, work practices, burial customs, disease and death - represents a new dimension in archaeological thinking. Superbly illustrated, Unearthing New Zealand also tells of the compelling detective work of today's archaeologists. Significantly, this survey of modern archaeological knowledge extends into European times, offering fascinating insights into aspects of our more recent history, where archaeological fact can be checked against and compared with the written record of the period.