Te Arawa treasures return home | Rotorua News | Local News in Rotorua

Treasured Maori artifacts will be returning to the Te Arawa region next year.

The Auckland Museum has agreed to loan 13 sacred objects to Rotorua Museum of Art and History.

"The loan of 13 significant taonga, many of which have not been seen here for over a century, is indeed visionary and a recognition of the special relationship that has existed between Te Arawa and Auckland Museum since the 19th century"," Rotorua Museum of Art and History director Greg McManus said.

The exhibition is set to be a feature in the new $22 million museum extension set to open in August next year.

"This will be the first time we will have the space to house these items," Mr McManus said.

"We will soon be able to tell much bigger stories and the people of Rotorua will be able to see their own taonga," he said.

Part of the exhibition will be a pataka (food storage house) named Te Oha. The wooden carved house originally sat at Waerenga village on the shores of Lake Rotorua.

Mr McManus said the pataka is about 4sq m and his team will be working closely with Auckland during the dismantling and reconstruction process. The house is made up of several carved and uncarved pieces interlocked and lashed together. It includes a part of a waka left by an adversary tribe.

"All of us involved with the negotiations over the past few months have been extremely impressed with the spirit of co-operation and respect shown by the board and management of Auckland Museum throughout the process. There is no doubt that these loans will be a major boost to Rotorua Museum as it continues to develop as a major cultural institution in its own right," Mr McManus said.

Rotorua kaumatua Te Rangipuawhe Maika said it was a re-uniting of the iwi's ancestors back to the area.

"It's important to us because we are bringing back our tupuna to Te Arawa - they are coming back to their decendants," he said.

"It's a practical thing that they're on loan because we could not accommodate all of our taonga that are in museums around the world.

"Pukenga Koeke o Te Whare Taonga o Te Arawa (iwi consultant group to the museum) are totally supportive. In fact we went up to Auckland and spoke face to face with them rather than sending letters or talk on the phone. Doing that was our way to uphold our law and kawa (customs) - person to person."

Interim director of Auckland Museum Sir Don McKinnon said the artifacts represented the unity people of Te Arawa have had with his museum.

"This loan has been the result of months of discussions with kaumatua of Te Arawa and Rotorua Museum. It represents an ongoing legacy of special relationships and ties between the people of Te Arawa and Auckland Museum for over 120 years."