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The Chinese Colonisation of New Zealand
Dr. Michael King
‘‘So’ said my neighbour, ‘you’ve written a general history of New Zealand.’ I admitted I had. ‘I’m really looking forward to reading it’ he went on, ‘especially the bit about the Chinese link’.
This is precisely the kind of comment every historian dreads. You labour away for years on a book. You think it is, if not ‘finished’ exactly, at least ready for publication - when somebody raises an aspect of the topic youıve never heard about. In this instance, I hoped my neighbour was referring to Winston Petersı election claim that Maori were descended from the Chinese. That at least was explicable and refutable.
‘No, no, no,’ he said. Iım talking about the colony that the Chinese established in New Zealand in the fifteenth century AD. Look, he scrabbled around the papers on his desktop. Hereıs an article about it.
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