FRAGMENTS OF BONE

New Zealand Times, Volume LIII, Issue 12357, 29 January 1926, Page 7

FRAGMENTS OF BONE

FOUND IN “LITTLE RANGITOTO” REMAINS OF A CANNIBAL FEAST MR GRAHAM'S THEORY Per Press Association. AUCKLAND. January 28. Maori relics are rarefy found on the Auckland isthmus nowadays, but from time to time long-buried human bones are dug up. One such find lias been made on the present summit of Little Rangrtoto, a small volcanic cone about half way between tlio Remuera tram terminus and Orakei basin. The larger part of the hill has been removed bv quarrying, and the highest point remaining is a part of the southern rim of the old crater. Here one of the City Council's quarry workmen found in about two feet of soil a number of human bones, nearly all fragmentary. They included parts of a jaw, with several well-worn but sound teeth, pieces of skull, and two halves of a thigh bone. All the Temains were dry and spongy, and of considerable age. With the bones there was found a piece of quartz which must have been brought from some part of the country. Mr Gilbert Archery, curator of the Auckland -Museum, who visited the site and examined tho bones, could not estimate how long they had been in the ground, although it was a matter of many years. He identified the two pieces of ]aw fouqd in another part of thoi quarry as those of a dog. Mr Arcnery removed some of the larger fragments for examination by ,Df. P. H. Buck, who is well-known as aii authority on the old-time Maori. •a* 0I^ e i y €ars a £o a large number oi Maori bones were found on the northern Sl< * of the crater, together with a . Bmall stone axe. People living on the south side of the hill have occasionally found bones when digging their gardens. On various parts of the site there are lasers of oyster and pipi shells, and deposits of wood ashes, indicating an old occupation. A few traces of terraces and pits can stilJ be seen. Like practically all other cones on the isthmus, Little Rangitoto was once a- pa fortified with palisades, enclosing a sucoessTon of terraces, but its history and even its true native name have ~® e . n lost. The hill was christened Little Rangitoto'' by early settlers, because of a fancied likeness between ito outline and that of the island cano.Mr George Graham, who has a wide knowledge of local Maori history con. aiders the hill could certainly not have been a burial place, since hill forts were never used for that purpose. It is much more probable, he thinks, that the bones are relics of a massacre, and possiblv of a cannibal feast. About the year 1760 the ancestors of the natives who now live at Orakei conquered the Auckland isthmus, and killed or 'enslaved its inhabitants. The hones being in fragments, and ncl representing a complete skeleton, were probably those of a prisoner who had been killed and eaten. They would not necessarily bo crushed in cooking. In the ruin and the burning of the pa they might very well have become covered; with a toot or two of debris, especially if the feast took place in a hut, the floor of which was below ground level.