Otaraia Pa site – visit to an unmarked village
At one stage in its journey, this Ruamahanga River-side sheep grazing paddock was home to 94 villagers, who grew maize, wheat and potatoes, fished the river for tuna/eels, sailed boats and paddled waka up and down the waterway, often 12 kilometers to the river’s mouth.
So explained local archaeologist Prof. Foss Leach, who used the visit of some 30 people to the Otaraia Pa site on March 17 to paint a picture of what was once a “substantial Maori settlement” on the banks of a meandering Ruamahanga.
Settlers like William Colenso _ who recorded 19 visits to the Pa in the 1840s and 50s _ recorded that among the villagers were 30 males, 50 wahine and at least 12 children.
Some 17 of the adults could read and write polished English _ in the late 1840s.
The first Pakeha school opened in the Wairarapa in 1856, the first Maori school at Papawai in 1860. … Continue Reading
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