Selective Chronology Of New Zealand history
Pre - 1760

925
   Ethnologists in the 19th and early 20th centuries estimated, using generational counting from Maori genealogy chants, that the mythological Polynesian navigator Kupe visited NZ in this year.

1150
   The same scholars set this date as the visit of Toi, another major figure of Maori mythology.

1350
   This was the year estimated for the arrival of the Great Fleet which brought the first mass settlement of NZ by Polynesian explorers. These three dates were part of NZ ‘history’ for many years, but all are now questioned by modern scholars and even the existence of the Great Fleet itself is largely discounted. The debate on time and the nature of early Polynesian settlement continues.

1642
   Abel Tasman, the first European to discover NZ, calls it Staten Landt and annexes it for Holland.