James Cowan invented the place name Tamaki Makaurau

How, when, and why did he take this action setting off a chain of events which reverberates today?

James Cowan (illustrated here) (1870–1943), journalist, author and historian, was a lifelong researcher of the Māori. He is usually known today for his two-volume work The New Zealand Wars: A History of The Maori Campaigns and The Pioneering Period, (1922–23). David Colquhoun, a biographer of James Cowan, explains: “Although little read today, during his lifetime his writing did much to shape the way New Zealanders perceived their history.”

As it happens, the single most influential act Cowan did in his lifetime was invent a new name for the Auckland isthmus. Others expanded it to include greater Auckland. In a nutshell, this is how it happened.

In 1898, Pember-Reeves entrenches Grey’s re-definition of Aotearoa

In 1855, from South Africa, George Grey published a book, which re-invented “Aotearoa” from meaning the North Island, to refer to all of New Zealand. William Pember-Reeves was a writer and formerly an MP at Christchurch. In 1898, while based in London as New Zealand’s Agent General, he published his new book, The Long White Cloud Ao Tea Roa. It is a well-written history of the country, popularly read at the time. It is also remembered ever since, because its title did much to propel “Aotearoa” into public awareness.

James Cowan was unhappy. Very unhappy, because he considered the correct translation of “Ao Tea Roa” to be “Long Bright World” and knew the Māori only applied it to the North Island, certainly not to all the islands of New Zealand. He wanted to set the record straight and correct Pember-Reeves, so he started writing his own article called “Maori Place Names”. He gives the meanings of several dozen place names, but while correcting one matter, he also weakened and created his own falsity.

Cowan copies him, and re-makes a Maori proverb into a name

Likely, Cowan first heard “Tāmaki makau rau”, when spoken by Mita Karaka at Waahi Marae, Huntly, in March 1899, when Cowan reported for the Auckland Star newspaper. His first translation of “Tamaki makau rau”, which he never used again, was “Tamaki of the hundred husbands”. Later, while reading back issues of the Auckland Star he found mention of Matutaera Tāwhiao’s visit to Auckland in 1882. The King’s secretary Kerei Kaihau, son of Aihepene Kaihau, rangitira of the Ngāti Te Ata, spoke the proverb when delivering the King’s speech. It was translated by the expert on te reo and Maori lore, Charles Davis. He referred to it as allusive phrase, “Tamaki of the hundred lovers”, meaning the district of Tamaki was coveted by the Maori. Cowan used Davis’ translation thereafter in his writings on travel and history.

Because Cowan admired the ethnographic works of Thomas H. Smith, he copied his style of hyphenation to emphasise words under study. Smith hyphenated Māori whakataukī (proverbs), but Cowan went further and hyphenated individual words within Māori toponyms, for example: Koro-rareka, Motu-tapu and Puke-kohe.

By using hyphens, Cowan made an alternative when he came to “Tāmaki”, the Māori name for the isthmus of land between the Waitemata and Manukau harbours, bounded by the canoe portages at Te Atatu and Ōtāhuhu. The old Polynesian word “tamaki” means “fight’ or ‘conflict”. In pre-European times the isthmus was originally known as “Rarotonga”, then became “Tāmaki”, most likely applied because of multiple conflicts over such desirable land. Rather than explain “Tāmaki”, Cowan much preferred a proverbial saying about the quality of the isthmus. Hence, he used “Tamaki-makau-rau” as a name because it enhanced his article by appearing as yet another poetic and meaningful example. But, by hyphenating the separate words of te reo, he suitably disguised his re-making of the descriptive phrase into a new name. There is even a modern parallel for Auckland: “City of Sails”. Which, of course, no one should ever confuse as a real name either.

“Maori Place Names” was read aloud at Auckland literary events in October 1899 and May 1900. The next month, Cowan’s article was published in the New Zealand Illustrated Magazine, immediately attracting a wide readership around the country and creating a meme in New Zealand European society, that “Tamaki-makau-rau” was a Māori place name for the Auckland isthmus. James Cowan planted a seed and it grew very slowly for 80 years.

In 1901, Edith Grossmann corrects Cowan’s falsity

The accomplished teacher, writer and feminist Edith Grossmann was, in 1897, a tutor of university students at Wellington. A year or two later she moved to Auckland. Grossmann must have read Cowan’s article in The New Zealand Illustrated Magazine, and published her own article in the Otago Witness newspaper. “Tamaki, Present and Past” (Part II) appeared on 16 October 1901. She writes :

These green terraces and hollows [of pā] were once their ramparts and their trenches. At that time the neighbourhood was, in Maori proverb, ‘Tamaki, of a hundred lovers’ — the scene of battle and conquest and possession, the prize of one great rangatira after another.

More experts on Te Reo correct Cowan’s falsity

In 1903, Vindex, a columnist at the New Zealand Herald, consulted Mercutio, his colleague who was an eye-witness to Rewi Maniapoto’s visit to Auckland in May 1879. The famous war-chieftain commenced with “Tamaki makau rau” in his arrival speech. But, no one in the crowd knew it, so he was asked about its meaning afterwards. It was researched at the time. Vindex published “A Historic Proverb” to set the record straight about “Tamaki makau rau”. This prompted a letter to the Herald, by Charles Nelson. He was a Swedish-born speaker of ten languages, who married into the Ngāti Whātua o Kaipara, and became an expert on Maori lore, earning the title “White Tohunga”. He was widely regarded as a real tohunga by the Maori. Nelson wrote that “Tamaki makau rau” was a proverb about the Tamaki district and he coined “whenua tamaki”, a contested land. He heard it spoken in 1868 at the Land Court for Ōrākei and Okahu. Hōri Tauroa, another rangitira of the Ngāti Te Ata, is the first person known to speak “Tamaki makau rau” and he began by introducing it as a proverb. Strong circumstantial evidence (detailed in the Whakatauākī of Te Kanawa Hypothesis) holds that the three-word proverb originates at Waiuku, in the 1860s, long after Governor Hobson founded and named Auckland. It is a contracted form of a memorable dozen-words which Te Kanawa Te Ikatu used at a great peacemaking in 1838. The Ngāti Te Ata were prominent at the event in Ōtāhuhu. They retold his metaphorical speech in their oral kōrero until, at least 20 years later, they coined the shortened form “Tamaki makau rau”.

Vindex is in clear agreement with Davis, Grossmann, and the Māori elders of the 19th Century.

Unfortunately, James Cowan misled George Graham, an amateur ethnologist and historian, into believing his invented place name was real. in 1904, Graham then confused the Ngāti Whātua o Ōrākei, although the Pīhema whānau were not confused and wrote in their records that “Tamaki makau rau” is a saying about the desirable isthmus.

In the first decade of the 20^th century New Zealand, railways were the principal mode of long-distance land transport. From his desk at the Department of Tourists, Cowan wrote for New Zealand Railways Magazine encouraging people to tour by train. Arguably, Cowan did read ‘Vindex’s 1903 correction and explanation of the proverb. For a few years, Cowan stood corrected on the matter, as he used Tamaki in his guidebook for tourists New Zealand or Ao-tea-roa: (The Long Bright World): Its Wealth and Resources, Scenery, Travel-Routes, Spas, and Sport (1907).

In 1908, Cowan decides to ignore the experts on Te Reo

The year 1908 has significance here. It is when Cowan crosses the Rubicon and starts using in his professional works, the new place name which he created in 1900. He must have visited George Graham and the Ngāti Whātua when back in Auckland and seen their welcome to the new Governor-General, Lord Plunkett, in 1904. Cowan realised they had taken his lead and were on record using Tamaki-makau-rau. Perhaps he felt aggrieved that he had to fall into line with Pember-Reeves and the Department of Tourists over changing the extent of Aotearoa. He took that as a green light for his own re-making of a piece of Māori culture . Cowan uses Tamaki-makau-rau three times in his significantly revised second edition of Long Bright World (1908).

Cowan uses the historic place name Tamaki in his 1907 cyclopaedic tourist guide, Long Bright World, but, in the 1908 edition, he re-starts the process of erasure, turning one of its proverbs into the place name.

In 1929, George Graham knows better but joins Cowan’s deceit

By 1925, Graham had learned much more by interviewing many Māori elders, born in the 1800s. He accepted and published “Tamaki-makau-Rau” was a “motto” for the isthmus, or proverbial. But, in January 1929, he pivoted once more, further revising Cowan’s invention by writing that “Tamaki-makau-rau” applied as a name to all of Auckland, not just the isthmus! At a stoke he vastly increased the range of the new name.  He ignores hundreds of years of Māori oral traditions, where surrounding districts held their own names: Aotea, Awhitu, Hauraki, Mahurangi, Manukau, Takapuna, Waiheke, Waitakere, etc. None of these places were ever within Tāmaki, nor was the proverb ever used for them. Calling them part of Tāmaki Makaurau is repressing and demeaning these great place names.

For decades, both Cowan and Graham gave oxygen to this new name by regular usage in English-language publications, until the obscure proverb “Tāmaki makau rau” was only known as a modern place name. Bizarrely, further spellings arose: Tāmakimakaurau and Tāmaki Makaurau, because they never agreed on a standard.

In 1980, David Simmons knows better but joins Graham’s and Cowan’s deceit

In 1968, David Simmons became an ethnologist at the Auckland Institute and Museum. Cowan and Graham were deceased, but he single-handedly completed what they started. In 1980, he formalised Tāmaki-makau-rau and Tāmakimakaurau in New Zealand academia. He used both in the influential journal Records of the Auckland Institute and Museum. Once established as perceived wisdom in academia, Cowan’s contrived toponym filtered through quasi-governmental organisations such as the Waitangi Tribunal, then spilled into the greater public domain, including today’s Māori culture.

When Auckland was founded, the proverb Tamaki makau rau did not yet exist

At the Land Court hearings in 1868, the missionary Robert Maunsell testified that the original site of Auckland was uninhabited in September 1840. It was when Captain Symonds negotiated purchase of the land and founded Auckland at governor Hobson’s instructions. Regarding settlements, the Māori only had names for their own, such as Onehunga and Ōrākei. Within months, the official land area of Auckland spread to the North Shore, outside of Tāmaki. In te reo, in the 19th century, the Māori always used the transliteration “Akarana” for Auckland.

The proverb “Tāmaki makau rau” was coined by the Ngāti Te Ata at Waiuku in the 1860s, during the re-telling of a much longer metaphor.. Afterwards, they used it a few times in the 19th Century including when Cowan first heard it used in 1899. A few usages of the proverb as a name occur during most of the 20th century, but since 1980, academics have taken James Cowan’s invention and deceived the Māori wholesale, into believing Tāmakimakaurau is a place name from their culture. The whole matter is a deeply shameful episode of James Cowan, a European, colonising Māori culture This in turn, leading to a reverse colonisation of European culture as well, now erasing the great name “Auckland”.

The Auckland Council should stop using the fake name Tāmaki makaurau, and take pride in the name of Auckland which generations of Aucklanders have known and used. It is a deep part of our shared national culture.