Tamaki Paenga Hira

The Maori name for the Auckland Museum is Tamaki Paenga Hira - Auckland´s memorial to fallen chiefs and their gathered taonga

Tamaki is Auckland, the net of Maki.

Paenga is to ceremonially layout, heap together on a marae, a margin, a chiefly boundary and a reference to those fallen in battle.

Hira is numerous, abundant, important, of consequence, great.

During the Taumata´s deliberations a name was sought that would capture former Director Dr Gilbert Archey´s Whaowhia (fill with treasures) and the Maori Language Commission´s 1992 title, Te Papa Whakahiku . Under the name Tamaki Paenga Hira we draw together those earlier meanings in a new name, which is uniquely of our region and universally representative of our collective history and peoples.