MAORI SITE DIGGINGS

Press, Volume CIII, Issue 30368, 18 February 1964, Page 17

MAORI SITE DIGGINGS

Trust Committee “Concerned” Concern at the absence of an authority to advise landowners of the bona tides of groups wishing to excavate Maori sites on their land was expressed at a recent meeting of the Canterbury regional committee of the New Zealand Historic Places Trust Members were disturbed at a report in “The Press" that the New Zealand Youth, Scientific, Historic, and Recording Society proposed to continue operations at Purau with the aid of schoolchildren members in the May and August holidays.

Speaking for the committee, the chairman (Mr C. Holdsworth) said that it would not wish to commend a group not sponsored by the New Zealand Archaeological Association or by a learned institution such as a museum or a university. If what the committee had heard in the case of the New Zealand Youth Society was correct, the committee was perturbed at the lack of scientific method inherent in the system whereby a member might keep the artifacts he found during the operations.

The committee was aware that strong objections to this society’s Purau excavations had been expressed by the Rapaki Maori community and the committee supported the Maori appeal to section owners not to permit such excavations on their properties, said Mr Holdsworth.