Episode notes
Just weeks after the Colonial Museum opened in 1865, someone slipped through the darkness and cut their way inside. A “short elderly man” and “experienced burglar”, vanished into the night with gold, precious stones, and a cache of taonga Māori.
In this episode, we retrace the break‑in, the hunt for culprit, and the strange trail of clues that led to the recovery of some taonga… while others disappeared into the city’s shadows. More than 160 years later, researchers are still following the threads, asking what was taken, what survived, and what stories these taonga continue to whisper.
Links
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Glossary
Tanga Māori - Māori cultural treasures
Hoa - friend
Tātou - we, us, you (two or more)
Hei Tiki - greenstone neck pendant depicting human image.
Pounamu - greenstone, nephrite, jade.
Toki Poutangata - greenstone adze - used as a weapon by a chief and is a symbol of chieftainship.
Toki - adze
Ka kite ano - see you again/next time