New Zealand researchers recently suggested that Māori, the indigenous people of mainland New Zealand have a substantially longer history with the southernmost continent of Earth.
A Science Alert report said, when thinking of Antarctic exploration, the description is overpoweringly white. The first verified sighting of mainland Antarctica was credited to an 1820 Russian expedition, while the initial landing on the mainland is credited to an 1821 American explorer.
The team of researchers, led by Priscilla Wehi, a conversation biologist from Manaaki Whenua Landcare Research, studied oral histories and "grey literature," which means reports, research, technical documents, as well as other materials published by organizations outside usual academic or commercial publishing mediums.
As a result, the study authors discovered a link to Antarctica, and its waters have been occurring since the oldest traditional voyaging, and later by partaking in the European-headed voyaging and exploration, modern scientific studies, fishing, and more for hundreds of years, Wehi explained.
The First Humans to See Antarctic Waters
The study investigators first emphasized an early seventh-century southern voyage by Hui Te Rangiora, a Polynesian chief, together with his crew.
This would have possibly made them the first-ever humans to see Antarctic waters, over a thousand years prior to the Russian expedition and even long before the planned migration of the Polynesian settlers to New Zealand.
In some descriptions, the researchers wrote in their paper, A short scan of Māori journeys to Antarctica, published in the Journal of the Royal Society of New Zealand, Rangiora, together with his crew, continued "a long way south."
In so doing, the team specified in their paper, they were probably the first humans to witness the Antarctic waters and possibly the continent.
Research Finding Not New to Māori Readers
The study authors also indicated in their work that the voyage and return of Hi Te Rangiora are part of the Ngāti Rārua people's history, and these stories exist in a number of carvings.
Such a finding may not be quite surprising to many Māori reads which have been sharing these stories for generations, although, as explained in the paper, academic literature still has a long way to go to draw alongside this wealth of knowledge.
The narratives of the so-called under-represented groups, as well as their connection to Antarctica, stay inefficiently documented and recognized in the research literature, wrote the team in their paper adding, this work starts to fill the gap.
Nonetheless, the voyage of Rangiora was definitely not the last time Māori, as well as their ancestors, traveled to Antarctica.
'Te Atu'
Essentially, a Ngāpuhi man called "Te Atu" has been called the first New Zealander and first Māori to see the coast of Antarctica in 1840 as part of the United States Exploring Expedition.
In addition, according to the New Zealand site, Māori was part too of the Heroic Age of Antarctic Exploration" during the late 19th and early 20th centuries, assisting European explorers with medicine, scientific expertise, construction, and more on trips to Antarctica.
Participation of Māori in Antarctic voyaging and expedition has continued until today, although it is hardly recognized or highlighted, according to the researchers. They added, for Māori on these travels, seafaring skills were considered the critical currency.
More recently, several Māori has, or are presently taking part in the Antarctic science program of New Zealand, conducting studies on everything from the impacts of climate change to penguin population ecology, and the research group behind this newest study is hoping such numbers will increase.
Related information about the indigenous people of New Zealand is shown on Turehu NZ's YouTube video below:
Check out more news and information on Antarctica on Science Times.
