14.7 Evidence from Field Archaeology
243
remnant population is only 1.13% of the 1445 population. The threat of extinction
faced by Maori in the non-pa areas with the full force of even the lowest feasible
population decline rate listed in Table 14.2 is undeniable.
Calculations using options from Table 14.2 with higher population decline rates
than Option 2 will have correspondingly higher population estimates for the total
population of the North Island non-pa areas in 1445, ranging as we have noted as
implausibly high as 15 million for Option 8.
Table 14.2, then, records a range of population decline rates in Little Ice Age New
Zealand, linked to infant mortality rates. So extreme are most of these population
decline rates that they point unambiguously to the conclusion that a 12th or 13th
century first settlement for New Zealand would have been out of the question. In the
demographic context revealed in Table 14.2, an argument for the continuous high
population growth levels required for a late first settlement of New Zealand cannot
be sustained.
14.7 Evidence from Field Archaeology
In Section 14.5 we suggested estimates for the total North Island populations living
outside the major pa areas of the North Island in 1445. These estimates were tied to
assumptions as to the number of survivors from these populations in 1801. In this
section we estimate the total pa population in the North Island in 1445. This estimate
depends on evidence from field archaeology. We can only propose a differential rate
of population decline in the pa areas as opposed to the non-pa areas once we have
estimates for the total pa population in the North Island.
Not many attempts have been made to estimate the total population of pa from
field evidence. In 1983, Aileen Fox [29] derived a formula that one household of
six, without children, equals one whare (hut) plus two kumara pits on one terrace.
Counting terraces and pits she arrived at population estimates for perhaps a dozen pa
[30]. Her attempt was made with the standard assumption of rising populations. She
therefore saw the estimates she derived using her formula as maximum estimates.
In the context of falling populations, however, these become minimum estimates.
There are inherent problems with Fox’s approach: the size of terraces varies considerably from pa to pa and even within a pa. A terrace 10 m by 5 m and one 30 m
by 20 m might be adjacent. Faced with the Otatara pa (see Fig 13.2) which has so
many small terraces they number thousands, Fox perhaps remembering Best’s comment that the “multitudinous linchets [small terraces] hewn out of the slopes would
accommodate thousands of people” [31] referred to them as a “multitude” [32] and
evaded the demographic implications of applying her formula to them. Kumara pits
likewise vary greatly in size and capacity.
Recent painstaking assembly and analysis of pa data by Tony Walton and Nicola
Molloy for the New Zealand Archaeological Association (2006, personal communication), makes the task of demographic analysis from pa data more feasible than
when Fox attempted the task. The data assembled by Walton and Molloy lists the
243
remnant population is only 1.13% of the 1445 population. The threat of extinction
faced by Maori in the non-pa areas with the full force of even the lowest feasible
population decline rate listed in Table 14.2 is undeniable.
Calculations using options from Table 14.2 with higher population decline rates
than Option 2 will have correspondingly higher population estimates for the total
population of the North Island non-pa areas in 1445, ranging as we have noted as
implausibly high as 15 million for Option 8.
Table 14.2, then, records a range of population decline rates in Little Ice Age New
Zealand, linked to infant mortality rates. So extreme are most of these population
decline rates that they point unambiguously to the conclusion that a 12th or 13th
century first settlement for New Zealand would have been out of the question. In the
demographic context revealed in Table 14.2, an argument for the continuous high
population growth levels required for a late first settlement of New Zealand cannot
be sustained.
14.7 Evidence from Field Archaeology
In Section 14.5 we suggested estimates for the total North Island populations living
outside the major pa areas of the North Island in 1445. These estimates were tied to
assumptions as to the number of survivors from these populations in 1801. In this
section we estimate the total pa population in the North Island in 1445. This estimate
depends on evidence from field archaeology. We can only propose a differential rate
of population decline in the pa areas as opposed to the non-pa areas once we have
estimates for the total pa population in the North Island.
Not many attempts have been made to estimate the total population of pa from
field evidence. In 1983, Aileen Fox [29] derived a formula that one household of
six, without children, equals one whare (hut) plus two kumara pits on one terrace.
Counting terraces and pits she arrived at population estimates for perhaps a dozen pa
[30]. Her attempt was made with the standard assumption of rising populations. She
therefore saw the estimates she derived using her formula as maximum estimates.
In the context of falling populations, however, these become minimum estimates.
There are inherent problems with Fox’s approach: the size of terraces varies considerably from pa to pa and even within a pa. A terrace 10 m by 5 m and one 30 m
by 20 m might be adjacent. Faced with the Otatara pa (see Fig 13.2) which has so
many small terraces they number thousands, Fox perhaps remembering Best’s comment that the “multitudinous linchets [small terraces] hewn out of the slopes would
accommodate thousands of people” [31] referred to them as a “multitude” [32] and
evaded the demographic implications of applying her formula to them. Kumara pits
likewise vary greatly in size and capacity.
Recent painstaking assembly and analysis of pa data by Tony Walton and Nicola
Molloy for the New Zealand Archaeological Association (2006, personal communication), makes the task of demographic analysis from pa data more feasible than
when Fox attempted the task. The data assembled by Walton and Molloy lists the