The spread of Polynesian settles

the Polynesians had explored and settled the eastern, northern and southern Pacific.

1400 BCE

By the fifteenth century CE, the Polynesians had explored and settled the eastern, northern and southern Pacific.

The Polynesian explorers made their way south

1200 BCE

In approximately 1000 CE, the Polynesian explorers made their way south to the largest of the Polynesian islands — Aotearoa or, as we know it, New Zealand. Aotearoa presented a very different climate and environment for its Polynesian settlers to adapt to

Canoes reached sumoa

1000 BCE

The Lapita arrived in Polynesia

982 BCE

They set sail again

1018

One thousand years later they set sail again, moving east across 3000 kilometres of open ocean.