History of Aotearoa New Zealand Podcast

The waka taua, war canoes, are one of the most enduring symbols of power and prestige from pre-European Aotearoa. Today is an extra long episode where we discuss their construction, symbolism and use…

We discuss a part of Māori warfare that was so important that when it arrived on the scene it forever changed the way Māori waged war, dominating the military and even physical landscape well into th…

Following on from the previous episode, we discuss some more Māori weapons. We cover some for the rangatira, like tewhatewha, and some that were more for the common folk, including the most feared we…

Waging war is a bit hard with just fists so in this episode and the one following we talk about the weapons Māori used to fight. In this episode we discuss some iconic weapons including the patu and …

The home stretch! Today we begin our final pre-European topic, Māori warfare. In this episode we discuss the reasons for war, from murder to migration as well as talking a bit about how Māori society…

A shorter episode today as I didn't have enough time this week for a full episode so I hope you enjoy this bite sized story from Tuhoe about Lake Waikaremoana in Te Urewera!

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This episode is a pretty special one! I am joined by Donna Kerridge, a rongoā Māori practitioner and advisor to ACC and the Ministry of Health, among other organisations, and is the founder of Ora Ne…

To fit with our recent episode on creatures from Māori folklore, here is a story involving the tūrehu, a type of fairy in Aotearoa! There might be a few more of these in the coming weeks involving no…

As we hurtle towards the first major shift in the content of HANZ I thought this would be a good time to take stock of where we are and make some changes!

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Today we have a one off special episode all about rongoā Māori, medicine! We discuss how spirituality was integrated into medical care, how medicine was applied and the plants they used!

WARNING: The …

Down here in Aotearoa it is the spooky season of autumn so here is a fun little episode all about ghosts, fairies, taniwha and all sorts of creatures from Māori folklore! Some we have seen before, ot…

We venture into Rarohenga as discuss what happens when a person passes into the next life, how a community grieves and follow the soul on its final journey.

This episode is a bit of a heavier one so t…

Today we will discuss more about the practicalities of religion, specifically karakia, divination, mākutu and magic. It's a lot of fun stuff around the more physical elements of relgion and magic tha…

We move away from talking darectly about the gods to discuss how tapu was navigated and talk a bit more about the people that helped do the navigating, the tohunga.

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We move down the tiers of gods to talk about some of the less powerful but more influential deities in daily life, as well as discussing how these atua were contacted.

Side note: I mispronounce Tamaki…

We have mentioned a couple of times over the last few episodes a Supreme God of the pantheon but haven't gone in depth into who this entity is. We change that this episode as we talk about exactly wh…

We follow on from the events of the separation of Rangi and Papa to look at the various godly wars that occurred between the Big Six as well as discussing more about what these multiple heavens are a…

In this episode we start our discussion on Māori religion! I realise this may be a slightly contentious subjuct so the first half is giving some disclaimers and historical context and the second half…

After his adventures in Episode 98, Tāwhaki lives a long and prosperous life but his final journey leads him somewhere he couldn't have expected.

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I am currently writing the next set of episodes so to tide you over for the next wee while I invited some more guests to come and play a fun little gameshow with me! This time we are celebrating the …