Gudgeon's FLAWED Maruwharanui Table

In the last blog, I referred to a "flawed"genealogy table of Maruwharanui that had been compiled by Native Land Court Judge Walter Gudgeon around 1905 and was first published in the Journal of the Polynesian Society in 1908 and then used by Percy Smith in his book History and Traditions of The Maoris of The West Coast, North Island of New Zealand, Prior To 1840.   Author Tony Sole reproduced Gudgeon's table in his work - Ngati Ruanui: A History in 2005.   Both tables are included below, stamped as being "invalid" by the Blog Author.

Gudgeon's table in 'no way' aligned with tables that were in the whakapapa books held by various whanau of note.  There was a huge difference!    Tribal Whakapapa Books indicated that Maruwharanui was of the original *tangata whenua* stock (autochthones) and was alive around the arrival of the Aotea Waka (from Hawaiiki). By stark contrast, Gudgeon's table stated that Maruwharanui lived 12 generations later and claimed he was of Tainui Descent. 

Unfortunately for us, Gudgeon's table was "published" and in the public domain and therefore became the dominant version misinforming readers everywhere and bringing our actual whakapapa into question by others.   Yet Gudgeon's table was a fabrication and the purpose of this blog post is to prove that point.

Gudgeon's Table

Sole's reproduction of Gudgeon's table

Debunking Gudgeon

According to Historian, Monty Soutar, Gudgeon derived all of his material from the Native Land Court Minute Books.  Gudgeon's provided a descent line from Maruwharanui down to Hakiaha Tawhiao of Taumarunui.   

Incidentally Hakiaha Tawhiao was Ngati Haaua and whilst he may have had Maru connections (because of the nature of whakapapa), he was NOT particularly known as belonging to Ngati Maru.   This fact alone made Gudgeon's chart seem suspect; surely a Ngati Maru whakapapa should have been a descent line to an actual 'known' Ngati Maru person! 

Checking the validity of Gudgeon's table was a simple task of locating evidence given by Hakiaha Tawhiao.  With the use of the Maori Land Court Minute Book Index (MLCMBI), produced by the Auckland University, Hakiaha's evidence was found in the Investigation of Title for the OTIRANUI BLOCK.   The whakapapa as it was recited by Hakiaha is in the image below.

Wanganui Minute Book 31 
24th August 1896
Native Land Court Wanganui
Judge Robert Ward 
Claim no 27  OTIRANUI area 5150 acres, plan WD 760

A comparison with the line in Gudgeon's table and Hakiaha's evidence quite plainly shows that Gudgeon replaced the name of the Wanganui tupuna TAMATUNA with PANEWERA.  

PANIWERA was a Ngati Maru Chief, referred to a number of times by Ngati Maru witnesses before the Native Land Court in the Whitianga Rehearing held in 1895.  Although, at no time was he referred to as the offspring of Rauroha or as the parent of Kahuparenga.

Wanganui Appellate Minute Book 4 
11th October 1895
Wanganui Appellate Court, Wanganui
Claim: Whitianga Rehearing

The fact that he consulted the Minutes for the Whitianga Rehearing, seems to indicate he was specifically looking for Ngati Maru whakapapa.   Although this case had substantial evidence by Ngati Maru people, no descent lines were given from Maruwharanui down to the witnesses. 
Historian, Angela Ballara stated that Judges favoured Hawaiiki whakapapa over Autochthone whakapapa, which is likely to be the reason that Maruwharanui lineage wasn't provided. 

In the absence of whakapapa, clearly Gudgeon created his own.  Gudgeon's table - a fabrication!