Since the early 1900s the fact that Polynesians (who became the Māori) were the first ethnic group to settle in New Zealand (first proposed by Captain James Cook) has been accepted by archaeologists and anthropologists.^[1][2] Before that time and until the 1920s, however, a small group of prominent anthropologists proposed that the Moriori people of the Chatham Islands represented a pre-Māori group of people from Melanesia, who once lived across all of New Zealand and were replaced by the Māori.^[3] While this claim was soon disproven by academics, it was widely and controversially incorporated into school textbooks during the 20th century, most notably in the School Journal. This theory subsequently spawned modern claims of a pre-Māori settlement of New Zealand by various ethnic groups, many conspiratorial in nature. Today, such theories are considered to be pseudohistorical and negationist by scholars and historians,^[4][5] and racist by many observers, with the Moriori myth having been used to justify settler colonalism.^{[6][better source needed][5][7]}

In recent times, a greater variety of speculation of New Zealand's first settlers has occurred outside of academia. These ideas typically incorporate aspects of conspiracy theories as they are in opposition to the last 100 years of academic research.^[8][9][10] The common acceptance of these unsubstantiated theories has been used by prominent politicians and public figures to attack Māori politics and culture.^[3][11]

Māori traditions speak of all manner of spirits, fairy folk, giants, and ogres living in parts of New Zealand when Māori arrived. The pale-skinned patupaiarehe are perhaps the most well-known, which Ngāti Kura, Ngāti Korakorako, and Ngāti Tūrehu are said to be sub-groupings of.^[12][13] In oral tradition, patupaiarehe taught weaving and net-making to the Māori, and could not come out during the day.^[14][15] Ponaturi were similar in that they could not tolerate sunlight, so they lived in the ocean.^[13]

In south Westland, Kāti Māhaki ki Makaawhio's Te Tauraka Waka a Maui Marae^[16] is named in honour of a tradition stating that Māui landed his canoe in Bruce Bay when he arrived in New Zealand.^[17] In a myth collected from Lake Ellesmere / Te Waihora, Māui threw a giant to the sea and buried him underneath a mountain to create the area around Banks Peninsula.^[18]

Kupe and Ngahue were both contemporaries famous for exploring New Zealand before notable migration voyages began.^[19] The latter discovered pounamu,^[20] the former introduced the first dogs (kurī) and created Lake Grassmere/Kapara Te Hau to drown Te Kāhui Tipua - who were described as 'giants' or 'ogres' living in Marlborough at the time.^[21] Both Kupe and Ngahue returned to Hawaiki,^[22] though Ngahue came back with the Arawa after a war with Uenuku.^[23]

Other Māori traditions exclude the existence of other humans in New Zealand upon their arrival. A well-known story is how Māui fished up the North Island out of the Pacific Ocean, which Te Rangi Hīroa of Ngāti Mutunga suggests might be a way to say he 'discovered' the island out of the blue, though the rest of the myth is very fanciful in saying parts of his canoe became different areas of both islands.^[24]

In the traditions of Ngāi Tahu's Waitaha descendants, Rākaihautū of the Uruaokapuarangi was the first man to set foot in the South Island by digging up the many lakes and waterways and filling them with fish. He brought with him the ancestors of the groups Te Kāhui Tipua, Te Kāhui Roko, and Te Kāhui Waitaha.^[25][26] According to Sir Āpirana Ngata of Ngāti Porou, Rākaihautū did not go south at all, but rather his legend was brought down there.^[27] Some accounts may say he is an ancestor of Toi through a daughter that stayed behind in Te Patunuioāio, who himself is an ancestor of Kāti Māmoe, Te Kāhea, Ngāpuhi, Ngāti Rāhiri Tumutumu, and Hāwea in some tellings.^[28] Hāwea might have alternatively been a different tribe that arrived on the Kapakitua before or at a similar time to Waitaha before merging with them, with other ancient tribal groupings possibly including the Maero and Rapuwai.^[29][30]

In Ngāi Tūhoe traditions, Toi's 'ancestor' Tīwakawaka was the first to settle the country aboard Te Aratauwhāiti, "but only his name is remembered".^[22] A man named Kahukura took Toi's own canoe, the Horouta, and returned to Hawaiki. He sent kūmara back to the new lands with the canoe.^[31]

During the 19th century, ideas about Aryan migrations became popular and these were applied to New Zealand. Edward Tregear's The Aryan Maori (1885) suggested that Aryans from India migrated to southeast Asia and thence to the islands of the Pacific, including New Zealand.^[33] These ideas were often linked with the hypothesis that Melanesians were the first to occupy the islands of the Pacific Ocean and were later replaced by the Polynesian peoples.^[34]

The writing of Percy Smith and Elsdon Best from the late 19th century also theorised about pre-Māori settlement. Their work inspired theories that the Māori had displaced a more primitive pre-Māori population of Moriori, in mainland New Zealand – and that the Chatham Island Moriori were the last remnant of this earlier race.^[3] Julius von Haast echoed this idea, suggesting an early nomadic people, who subsisted mainly on moa hunting and beachcombing, were superseded by the Māori who introduced agriculture and lived in small villages.^[35]

Starting in the 1920s, H. D. Skinner and others overturned this hypothesis by showing the continuation and adaptation of the 'Archaic' Māori culture into the 'Classic' Māori culture. This negated the need for pre-Māori settlement in models of prehistoric New Zealand. Since this time archeology has become a more professional and scientifically rigorous practice and the model of Polynesians arriving in an uninhabited New Zealand and adapting to its environment has not fundamentally changed.^[36]

Modern New Zealand archaeology has clarified of the origin and dates of the earliest migrations, establishing firmly that Māori were the first people to settle New Zealand, in line with Māori oral history. As far back as the 19th century, any claim to the contrary has been considered to be inherently pseudohistorical due to an outright lack of evidence. In spite of this, the New Zealand School Journal made negationist claims until the 1960s that the Moriori were the actual indigenous people of New Zealand, but had been violently replaced and exiled by Māori.^[37] The "Moriori myth" has spawned multiple other conspiracy theories about a pre-Māori civilisation,^[38] many of which are considered openly racist and are closely associated with white supremacists.^[39][40] These are considered conspiracy theories because of their common allegation that Māori are fraudulently presenting themselves as indigenous peoples, and for their distortion of the historical record.^[41][42]

Some conspiracy theorists have continued to speculate that what is now New Zealand was discovered by Melanesians, Celts, Greeks, Egyptians or the Chinese, before the arrival of the Polynesian ancestors of the Māori.^[43][44] Some of these ideas have also been supported by politicians and media personalities.^[45][46] For example, Don Brash, formerly leader of the New Zealand National Party, is a high-profile proponent of pre-Māori settlement theories.^[8][47] An earlier proponent of the racist conspiracy theory of a pre-Polynesian European settlement of New Zealand was by white supremacist and Holocaust denier Kerry Bolton. In his 1987 pamphlet Lords of the Soil,^[48] he states that "Polynesia has been occupied by peoples of the Europoid race since ancient times".^[49] Other books presenting such theories have included The Great Divide: The Story of New Zealand & its Treaty, (2012) by Ian Wishart, a journalist, and To the Ends of the Earth by Maxwell C. Hill, Gary Cook and Noel Hilliam, which claims without evidence that New Zealand was discovered by explorers from ancient Egypt and Greece.^[50]

Historians and archaeologists dismiss any such theories. Michael King wrote in his history of New Zealand, "Despite a plethora of amateur theories about Melanesian, South American, Egyptian, Phoenician and Celtic colonisation of New Zealand, there is not a shred of evidence that the first human settlers were anything other than Polynesian",^[4] and Richard Hill, professor of New Zealand Studies at Victoria University of Wellington, said in 2012, "Not one of [the theories] has ever passed any remote academic scrutiny."^[5] Hugh Laracy of the University of Auckland called them "wild speculation" that has been "thoroughly disposed of by academic specialists".^[51] Another historian, Vincent O'Malley, and the New Zealand Archaeological Association regard the theories as having a racist or at least a political element, seeking to cast doubt on Waitangi Tribunal claims.^[5][7] Scott Hamilton in "No to Nazi Pseudo-history: an Open Letter" further explains objections to the theories of Bolton and Martin Doutré (and the website Ancient Celtic New Zealand).^[52]

• Archaeology of New Zealand
• Māori history
• Moehau
• Natural history of New Zealand
• Pseudoarchaeology