Who ruled Auckland?

Auckland is spread across a narrow isthmus in the north of New Zealand's North Island, between the Waitematā Harbour opening east to the Pacific and the Manukau Harbour opening west to the Tasman Sea. The isthmus is dotted with some fifty small volcanoes. Its fertile soils, two harbours and short portages between them made it one of the most coveted pieces of land in Māori New Zealand, and the same advantages later made it the colony's first capital and the country's largest city.

Polynesian voyagers, heirs to the long tradition of Polynesian navigation, reached New Zealand in the late thirteenth century, and Māori settled the isthmus by about the 1300s. They called it Tāmaki, and later Tāmaki Makaurau, often translated as "Tāmaki desired by many". Rangitoto, the youngest volcano, rose from the Hauraki Gulf only about six hundred years ago, and its eruptions were witnessed by Māori living nearby. From around 1600 the tribes of the isthmus terraced the volcanic cones into fortified pā with storage pits and gardens, and by the early eighteenth century a confederation known as Waiohua dominated the area.

In the 1740s Ngāti Whātua from the Kaipara to the north invaded and killed the Waiohua paramount chief Kiwi Tāmaki, then secured their hold through intermarriage. Early in the nineteenth century the isthmus was caught up in the Musket Wars, when northern tribes armed with European guns raided widely, and much of the area was left thinly occupied.

After the Treaty of Waitangi in 1840, Ngāti Whātua, hoping for protection and trade, offered Governor William Hobson land on the Waitematā. A flag was raised at the founding ceremony on 18 September 1840, and Hobson named the settlement after his patron, Lord Auckland. It became the capital of the colony of New Zealand in 1841. Settlers bought up surrounding land quickly, and within a generation Ngāti Whātua were left with only a small block at Ōrākei.

In 1863 Auckland served as the base for the colonial invasion of the Waikato, launched along the Great South Road against the Māori King movement. Two years later, in 1865, the capital moved to Wellington, which was more central for the growing South Island. Auckland compensated with commerce: its port shipped timber, kauri gum and gold from the Coromandel, and the city grew into a hub of the British Empire in the South Pacific. By the early twentieth century it had overtaken its rivals to become the largest city in New Zealand.

In the twentieth century Auckland spread outward along railway lines and then motorways, and the Harbour Bridge of 1959 linked it to the North Shore. From the 1950s many Māori moved to the city from the countryside, and large numbers of migrants came from Samoa, Tonga, the Cook Islands, Niue and other Pacific islands, making Auckland home to the largest Polynesian population of any city in the world. In the 1970s police "dawn raids" targeting Pacific Islanders accused of overstaying visas left a lasting grievance, for which the government formally apologised in 2021. In 1977 and 1978 Ngāti Whātua protesters occupied Bastion Point for 507 days to resist the sale of land at Ōrākei, and part of the land was later returned through the Treaty settlement process.

Since the 1990s heavy migration from Asia has further diversified the city. Its councils were merged into a single Auckland Council in 2010. Auckland today has about 1.7 million people, roughly a third of New Zealand's population, and is the country's main economic centre.