The Maoris

http://mp.natlib.govt.nz/detail/?id=28686&l=mi

Handed down through the centuries, the arts and the crafts we see today amply justified their intelligence. The Maoris. They made plenty of intricate carvings and contained Indian influences. They are warm people too by the fact their salutation consists of handclasp and noses touch.

The Maori has created New Zealand with great history and poetry together with legends, traditions and myths. A century back, there were about 60,000 Maoris. The name, New Zealand, given by a navigator. A Maori, he continued in giving of names to plenty of bays and capes when he sailed around the South Islands and the North Islands of New Zealand. Captain Cook used this Maori sailing direction 600 years later.

Maori settlement of New Zealand began long ago and was an outstanding success as they prospered and multiplied. New Zealand was a Crown Colony of Britain. And with the Treaty of Waitangi, all Maoris have the equal rights and the equal privileges of British subjects. The Maoris are pround to be British subjects and they appreciated the just and democratic treatment accorded to them by the Empire.

In the past, things like feather cloak or tattooing are symbols of rank to the Maorian and today they no longer wears the traditional garb, but they are well educated professionals and play prominent role in the economy.