216: Oldest known (Polynesian) Artefact in NZ

Tairua is home to the oldest known recorded and recognised artefact in NZ - (so far!).

This fishing lure shank is made from the shell of a black-lipped pearl oyster, which only lives in the tropics. The shank was found in an archaeological site at the base of a pohutukawa in Tairua on the Coromandel Peninsula. It is one of a very few existing items known to have been brought to New Zealand by early Polynesian arrivals. Māori adapted the trolling-lure shanks in New Zealand, using stone, bone and local shell instead of pearl-oyster shell.

Early Polynesians would have brought it with them when they voyaged to New Zealand, and its design could suggest that it came from the Marquesas they say. The lure is one of very few such items that archaeologists are certain came from Polynesia. The layer in the midden where it was found has been carbon-dated to between 1267 and 1392 AD.

It now is displayed in the Auckland Museum (below).

Below are some Marquesan lures. They lack the hole and the formed base. If these are the only examples of Marquesan lures we doubt the Tairu find was Marquesan.

We know of older artifact. It was found below a burial site where the local Maori said the skeleton belonged to those here before they came. A human tooth necklace was also part of that burial. The artifact we refer to has a design and material composition unlike anything we have ever seen before and is old.... very old! If it were not found as part of the ancient burial, questions may be raised about it. But it was part of that ancient burial, and it remains hidden away until the time is right to reveal it.