Quite a history about the Maori - put the Incas or the Aztecs to shame in degeneration. Outcast from the Cook Islands during the 13th century as weaker primitive Neolithic people by later waves of Polynesians (Maori were from the original wave of primitive Polynesians pushed right out across the Eastern Pacific by successive stronger more advanced groups arriving from the west).

They were outcast on rafts and some floated to the North East Coast of NZ driven by the South Equatorial Current and were stranded for 500 years. The weaker were pushed down to the South Island or Chathams etc. So the South Island Maori (had their own language) were the weakest of the weak. They were captured and eaten as ‘slave flesh' by the northern Maori doing raids. (Well they all ate each other - 80% of Maori pre-European were dark skinned, easily fattened slaves, farmed and eaten by a lighter skinned 'Ariki’ thin, wiry, elite royal caste).

So it was with some righteousness as well as British cunning that they armed the southern Maori, who then with muskets launched a genocidal war on the north. That plus measles and flu halved the Maori population and removed most of the elite. The British then liberated the slaves and outlawed cannibalism. The northern Maori fought with the British against the south bad west Maori 'rebels'.

The Maori sued for peace and a treaty was signed that removed all sovereignty and made them subjects to the English crown where the English would protect them from each other. Land could only be sold to or via the Crown. Maori could live on their reservations with native custom - but none did. The Treaty of Waitangi is strikingly clear in that the Maori cede sovereignty completely and become citizens of Great Britain - all 3 clauses lock that in.