IWI / HAPU AFFILIATIONS

Wiremu Tako Ngatata was born around 1815 at Pukeariki pa in Taranaki. His father was Ngatata-i-te-rangi of Te Ati Awa and his mother Whetowheto of Ngati Ruanui. Wi Tako Ngatata left Taranaki in 1832, moving permanently to the Wellington region with a grouping of his people. The transition was not smooth and his people came into conflict with iwi already established in the area. By 1840, Pakeha settlement disrupted and complicated occupational arrangements in the Wellington region.

In colonial terms, Wi Tako provided considerable assistance to the Crown in purchasing land for early settlers. By the 1860s the greater part of Wellington passed into the hands of settlers and the Colonial Government. In Māori terms land sales of Māori land were manipulated by the Crown with little understanding by Māori of the agreements being brokered by agents of the Crown.

In 1848, writing from his Ngauranga property, Wi Ngatata wrote to Donald McLean after hearing of hostility and prejudice by Pakeha toward Māori, he stated:

E kore au e pai kia utu, toku toto ki te paraikete ki te hoiho

Engari pea he toto mana waku toto

I will not agree to give my blood for a blanket or a horse

Except perhaps blood for blood [1]

Ngatata became one of the first Māori members of the Legislative Council in 1872. He died in 1887 aged over eighty years old. He had a 17-room home near Park Avenue in Lower Hutt and the homestead was named Te Mako for Te Mako pa at Te Taitai (Taita). Wiremu Tako Ngatata is buried in the Pito-one (Petone) cemetery, near Wellington.

NM

[1] MS Papers - 0032-0672c-08. Object #1031679 Letter from Witako to McLean (with translation), 1 Sept 1848