DNA to rock a Nation Changing Our New Zealand History Tears run from her translucent eyes as Monica Matamua learns the news that may change the path for her tribe and answer questions that have been haunting her whanau for generations. Eyes are the windows to the soul and for 72-year-old Monica, her eyes tell a story better than any words can. Those hazel eyes speak of a tribe of people, steeped in history and entwined throughout the years of Maori folklore, yet until now, fobbed off as eccentrics, strangers and in some cases, ‘mystical beings’. The Patupaiarehe people (and the Urukehu) are well known for their light skin, fair hair and translucent eyes, which is evident when looking at Monica, who has been bullied and teased for years because of the way she looks. “I always knew I was different, but it has been a long and difficult fight to tell my story.” A grandmother of 62 children and great grandmother of two, the beauty that emanates from this sweet and gentle woman belies a life of abuse from school friends, ignorance from other tribes and constant struggles with the Treaty of Waitangi land claim department. Unlike many Maori people, Monica believes that her tribe came from a different lineage, one which travelled from overseas and brought new and interesting skills to New Zealand. Mostly, she believes that these people did not find New Zealand by mistake, in fact they mapped their way to the country. And she’s not alone in her beliefs. In fact as far back as the 1930s, historian James Cowan portrays a picture of a girl in The Maori: Yesterday and Today, with the caption: “Urukehu girl, of the Urewera tribe at Mataatua (Ruatahuna). This is the ancient fair-haired type, pure Maori.” (Cowan, 1930). The early New Zealand painter G F Angas also reproduced in his book, The New Zealanders, a painting entitled: “Children of the boiling springs by Taupo Lake.” The painting depicts three Maori children, the centre boy having blond hair. Angas wrote of his painting: “The boy whose portrait is given in the centre figure… is the son of one of the chiefs of Tukano, a settlement near the boiling springs of Taupo Lake, where no intermixture with Europeans could have taken place.” (Angas, 1847, Plate 22, 54). According to Maori anthropologist Sir Peter Buck, there were several braids of reddish hair that were exhibited at the Auckland Museum for the general public. Monica doesn’t need academics to tell her what she already knows. Her mother (a red haired, green eyed beauty) stuck to the story of her people. “Our story is mystical, and if I hadn’t witnessed some things myself I probably wouldn’t believe it,” says Monica in her quietly spoken way. Along with the skills to map the seas, her people were also highly competent farmers who made the most of the different seasons by growing food based on the lunar cycle. According to Monica, leading authorities on information relating to the Treaty of Waitangi have stated that the Te Hotu tribe is completely extinct, including Dr Angela Ballara, a leading authority on Maori history as it pertains to the Treaty of Waitangi. “When I read the information she wrote in her thesis, I was really angry. It was all bulldust,” exclaims Monica. Apparently Dr Ballara wrote that Monica’s great grandfather, Te Puoho, had died in the South Island. However, according to Monica he was buried in Tu Kanu, Waihi, next to her great grandmother. “Dr Ballara never contacted us to get the story, she only spoke with people from the Tuwharetoa tribe.” Partly due to misinformation and due to a strong force behind other tribes in the region, Monica and her family lost their land to the courts in 1998. The place that Monica and her family called home was Te Rena on the banks of the Whanganui River. Sadly it was to be absorbed by the Crown and still sits to this day untouched. “The house has been torn down and the gardens that were planted on the land no longer exist.” Up until it had been taken from Monica’s family, the land had been used as both a home for her family and as a place for backpackers to visit and find out more about the Maori culture. The visitors would assist with farming the land and would learn stories about Monica’s culture. The Fight For Home Since losing her home, Monica has fought to get the land back under the Treaty of Waitangi. During the hearings Monica stated that the area surrounding her home was once populated by Ngati Hotu, “who descend from the Urukehu, a people renowned for their fair skin, green eyes and red hair.” (Matamua, Wai 903, no. 19, paragraph 36, 5). Although the jury is still out on whether Ngati Hotu still exists, there are many examples of historical books which assert that they are still alive and well. In fact in an excerpt from information written by Sir John Te Herekiekie Grace in his history of the Tuwharetoa, who occupied the Taupo district, he writes: “Ngati Tuwharetoa was a tribe that originally settled on the Bay of Plenty coast and during the 16th century found its way into Taupo. It found these tribes in occupation of the district, but by gradual absorption, diplomatic alliances and aggressive warfare, finally took complete possession of the land. The original occupants of the land were a tribe of the fair skinned and flaxen haired people called Ngati Hotu. They lived by the lake in company with another fair skinned tribe, Ngati Ruakopiri. The third tribe was Ngati Kurapoto.” (Grace, 1992, 19). But Monica still continues to battle for land which has been vandalised and ignored. Land that had been treated with such respect prior to being taken into possession by the Treaty of Waitangi land claims department. “Why take it, only to leave it in such a state?” asks Monica. A Hidden Land, A Hidden Language Along with the special connection her people have with their land, Monica also speaks of a language which is almost extinct and is nothing like the Maori language that is taught in schools and originates from Nga Puhi. “There are only two people in our tribe that can speak our language now and it is nothing like Maori, in fact it is nothing like a language I have ever heard before.” Both Monica and her grandson Tamati hope to preserve the language by videoing the remaining two elders. Since he was a young child Tamati has heard the stories of his whanau from his grandmother, but it wasn’t until recently that he truly believed the stories. In order to preserve his grandmother’s history, Tamati, who studied film at university, has taken it upon himself to video her stories. “I didn’t really know if I believed everything she said, but since talking to her and after the recent DNA evidence, I realise how what she says makes so much sense.” Monica ascertains that the Ngati Hotu tribe spans back 74 generations (40 generations longer than the descendants of Kupe) and she believes her people come from a different background to other tribes. This is evidenced by the different skin tone, hair and eye colour of her ancestors. “We have red hair and fair skin. I have felt different to my friends because of the way I look all my life.” Until recently Monica only had her family history to fall back on, history that had been handed down from parent to child for 74 generations. However, she now believes that thanks to modern day technology, her family might finally have the answer they have dreamt of for so long. The Answer To So Many Questions The stories that Monica has shared with her family sometimes fell on deaf ears, but it wasn’t until she participated in the National Geographic DNA Ancestry Project that she began to get answers to her questions. In the DNA project, citizens worldwide are given the opportunity to find out more about their ancestors using genetic genealogy. It asks the question, how did your family end up in the country you live in? While we are all descendants of Africa between 50,000 and 200,000 years ago, many of us left and moved to other parts of the world. As our ancestors migrated out of Africa, small changes known as mutations occurred in our DNA. According to the National Geographic DNA website: “As generations passed, each mutation links our ancestor to a specific time and place in history. The mutations that we find in our own DNA tell the story of our own ancestral past”. Through this study, participants can obtain real time geographical overviews of how markers compare to other participants’ markers and find out where ancestors originated from and where they have scattered throughout time. The participant obtains a participation kit which contains four swabs, each of which they rub inside their cheek for thirty seconds and mail back to the laboratory. Once the DNA has been tested by the laboratory, the participant can log in on line to find out more about what their DNA holds. Once you are part of the DNA Ancestry Project you can watch as your journey unfolds. The more people who participate in the project, the more you get to find out about your ancestry. At time of print, just under 630,000 people worldwide have completed the project. The reasoning behind this project is to get a clearer picture of migratory patterns and a good understanding of when certain races arrived in each country. For Monica, this was an excellent chance to prove her lineage and find out how her ancestors arrived in New Zealand. As a female, she could only get access to her maternal line. According to the DNA website, “Information about paternal lineage is determined from a series of markers on the Y-chromosome, something that only men genetically carry. Therefore, this particular part of the story is not available to female participants.” The results of Monica’s DNA test are back and they have life-changing findings that have rocked both Monica’s life and, she believes, will change the general consensus regarding the existence of the Ngati Hotu tribe and their many generations of association with New Zealand and the land that is so dear to them. In the next edition, we find out Monica’s DNA results. References: Matamua Monica et al, 2008. Brief of Evidence In the Matter of the Treaty of Waitangi Act 1975, Waitangi Tribunal, Wellington, New Zealand. Antrocom Online Journal of Anthropology 2010, vol. 6, n. 2 Grace John Te Herekiekie, 1992. Tuwharetoa: a history of the Maori people of the Taupo district, Reed Books, Auckland, New Zealand. elocal.co.nz/View_Article~Id~1076~title~ELocaL%20COMMUNITY%20MAGAZINE%20-%20View%20Articles.html
Posted on: Tue, 29 Jul 2014 20:08:08 +0000
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