New Zealand Needle
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N 51° 28.998 W 000° 00.548
30U E 707659 N 5707813
Quick Description: The New Zealand Wars, sometimes called the Land Wars and also once called the Maori Wars, were a series of conflicts that took place in New Zealand between 1845 and 1872. The wars were fought over a number of issues, most prominently Maori land being
Location: United Kingdom
Date Posted: 9/15/2007 2:31:08 PM
Waymark Code: WM273M
Views: 18
Long Description:The Treaty of Waitangi, signed in 1840, guaranteed that individual
Maori iwi (tribes) should have undisturbed possession of their
lands, forests, fisheries and other taonga (treasures). Some early
colonial land-sale deals had a dubious basis, to say the least, and
the parties involved sometimes hurried them through before the
signing of the Treaty. To avoid such situations happening again,
the newly constituted British colonial authorities decreed that
Maori could sell land only to the Crown (the Right of Preemption).
However, many settlers did not appreciate that Maori owned their
land communally and that permission to settle on land did not
always imply sale of that land. Under pressure from settlers, the
Colonial Government gradually ignored the provisions of the Treaty
of Waitangi and permitted settlers to settle in areas that had
uncertain ownership. Maori began resisting the alienation of their
homelands to the British settlers, and the whole process sowed the
seeds of eventual war.
From Wikipedia… ("http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maori_Wars"
target="_blank">visit link)