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🗺️ Places and Names of Aotearoa

Years 6 to 10 · Read up first

10 questions. Get 8 right to earn 10 minutes. All 10 right = +5 bonus. They start easy and get harder as you go, so treat the first few as a warm-up. Every one you miss comes back with the answer and why.

1. What does 'kāinga' mean?

Home or villageStorage pitMeeting houseWar canoe

2. What does 'roto' mean, as in Rotorua or Rotoiti?

LakeMountainForestBridge

3. What is Hamilton's Māori name, Kirikiriroa, said to describe?

A long stretch of gravel along the Waikato RiverA field of flowersA steep cliffA deep lake

4. What geological feature does 'maunga' most often describe when it appears in a place name in the Auckland area?

A forest clearingA sandy beachA river mouthA volcanic peak

5. What is the Māori name for Stewart Island, New Zealand's third largest island?

KapitiRangitotoMotutapuRakiura

6. What does the presence of both an English and a Māori name on an official map, such as Aoraki / Mount Cook, usually signal?

That mapmakers made an errorFormal recognition that the place carries two histories, side by sideThat the Māori name is only temporaryThat the two names are simply spelling variants of each other

7. Milford Sound, in Fiordland, carries which Māori name?

NgāmotuWhakatūRakiuraPiopiotahi

8. What does the dual naming of places like Mount Aspiring, also called Tititea, generally reflect?

That English names always came firstThat one of the two names must be wrongThat mountains never had Māori names before Europeans arrivedThat a landscape can carry more than one name and more than one history, both worth knowing

9. What does a place name built from 'wai' plus a description, such as Waitomo, usually tell you?

That the place was named by a ship's captainThat the place has no water nearby at allSomething about water at that location, in this case caves with an underground streamThat the name has nothing to do with the landscape

10. Why is the exact translation of some traditional Māori place names sometimes debated, even among fluent speakers?

Because place names are re-invented every yearBecause there is only ever one possible meaning for any nameBecause Māori place names have no fixed spelling at allBecause some names were composed generations ago, and their original context or wordplay is not always fully recorded

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