📚 Unit Plans → 🌍 History 2.4: Perspectives → 📄 Treaty Text Comparison — History 2.4 Lesson 3
Year 12 Tikanga-ā-Iwi / Social Sciences
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Treaty Text Comparison — Whakataurite Tuhinga · Article 1

Level 2 History · History 2.4 · Lesson 3 · Work in pairs — use both texts to answer the questions below
 
 
Context: Te Tiriti o Waitangi / The Treaty of Waitangi was signed on 6 February 1840 at Waitangi, in the Bay of Islands. There were two versions — an English text (drafted by Hobson and Busby) and a Māori text (translated overnight by Henry Williams). The two texts say different things about the most important question: what power did Māori agree to give the Crown? Article 1 is where the critical difference appears.
English text — Article 1
The Chiefs of the Confederation of the United Tribes of New Zealand and the separate and independent Chiefs who have not become members of the Confederation cede to Her Majesty the Queen of England absolutely and without reservation all the rights and powers of Sovereignty which the said Confederation or Individual Chiefs respectively exercise or possess, or may be supposed to exercise or to possess over their respective Territories as the sole sovereigns thereof.
Māori text — Ko te tuatahi
Ko ngā Rangatira o te Wakaminenga me ngā Rangatira katoa hoki ki hai i uru ki taua wakaminenga ka tuku rawa atu ki te Kuini o Ingarani ake tonu atu — te Kawanatanga katoa o ō rātou wenua.

[Translation: The chiefs of the Confederation and all the chiefs who have not joined the Confederation give absolutely to the Queen of England forever the complete governorship of their land.]
English term Māori text term What each means The critical difference
Sovereignty Kāwanatanga Sovereignty = full, supreme political authority over a territory and its people — the right to make all laws, own all unclaimed land, and override all other authorities.

Kāwanatanga = governorship — the power to govern (manage day-to-day affairs), but not necessarily supreme authority. The word was adapted from "Governor."		 The gap: When rangatira heard "kāwanatanga," many understood they were granting limited administrative authority over Pākehā settlers — not surrendering their own political sovereignty.

The Crown read the English text and understood they had received full sovereignty over all of New Zealand.

This is not a minor translation error — it is the source of 180+ years of Treaty dispute.
(not in Article 1 English text) Tino rangatiratanga Full, undiminished chiefly authority — guaranteed to rangatira in Article 2 of Te Tiriti. Rangatira expected to retain this over their own lands and people.
Tasks — Ngā Mahi · Work with your partner
Task 1: In the English text, circle the word sovereignty. In the Māori text, circle the word kāwanatanga. These are not equivalent translations. Complete this sentence:
"These two words are different because 'sovereignty' means _______ while 'kāwanatanga' means _______."
Task 2: Imagine you are a rangatira on 5 February 1840. You have just heard the Māori text read aloud by Henry Williams. You speak no English. What do you believe you are agreeing to give the Queen?
Tautoko — support scaffold: "Rangatira who signed believed they were keeping _______ because the Māori word used was 'kāwanatanga,' which means _______. They would only give the Queen _______."
Task 3: Now imagine you are Governor Hobson reading the English text. What do you believe you have received from the signing?
Task 4 — Discussion: Nōpera Panakareao, a rangatira who signed at Kaitāia on 28 April 1840, said: "The shadow of the land goes to the Queen, but the substance remains with us." Less than a year later, on 25 January 1841, he retracted this — the missionary Richard Taylor recorded him saying he feared he had been deceived.
What does his retraction tell us about how rangatira's understanding of the Treaty changed over time?
Irreconcilability check: Could the rangatira who signed in 1840 and the Crown ever have fully agreed on what the Treaty meant — given these two different texts? What would have needed to be different for agreement to be possible?

📋 Teacher Planning Snapshot

Ngā Whāinga Ako — Learning Intentions

A paired-work sheet carrying Article 1 of the English text and Article 1 of te Tiriti in full, with four numbered tasks on the divergence between them.

Ngā Paearu Angitū — Success Criteria

Differentiation & Inclusion

Scaffold support: Work in pairs — the sheet has two name fields for that reason. Students who cannot yet handle the 1840 register should work strictly through the four numbered tasks rather than reading the texts cold. Extend by asking which text a court should follow, and why that is a live question.

ELL / ESOL: Fluent te reo speakers have a genuine advantage on the Māori text here — say so, and pair deliberately. Gloss cede, reservation and sole sovereigns before the comparison starts.

Inclusion: The sheet is designed to be written on. Allow annotation, highlighting and marginal notes as valid output; the comparison matters more than the neatness of the answer.

Mātauranga Māori: Both texts are printed in full and neither is presented as the correct one. That is the design: te Tiriti is not a translation appended to the real document, it is the text almost every rangatira actually signed.

Prior knowledge: Use in Lesson 3, in the 15-minute side-by-side comparison, before the three-perspective mapping.