One Tree Hill

The Māori name Maungakiekie translates to ‘mountain of the kiekie vine’, though other translations give the meaning as ‘totara that stands alone’. The mountain and its surrounds were home to the Wai o Hua tribe, since the early 1700s and probably before that time. Other Māori tribes in the Auckland area can also trace their ancestry to the mountain.

Maungakiekie was the largest and most important Māori Pā in pre-European times. The cone and its surroundings are estimated to have been home to a population of up to 5,000. At this time, the Nga Marama chief Kiwi Tamaki held the pa and used its strategic placement to exact tribute from travelers passing from Northland to the rest of the North Island through the rich isthmus. Its position between the Waitemata Harbor to the East (opening upon the Pacific Ocean) and the Manukau Harbor to the West (opening onto the Tasman Sea) afforded a wide variety of seafood from the two harbor. The volcanic soil of the slopes of the mountain proved highly fertile and easy to defend from raiding parties from other tribes due to its steep sides and imposing palisades. The inhabitants terraced the hill extensively, and it is considered to be the largest prehistoric earthwork fortifications worldwide. It is also the largest and most complex volcanic cone / earth fortress known in the Southern Hemisphere.

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