Guest Post: Mount Tawera Merely Burps

 This post first appeared on Today in Alternate History.

Oct 31, 1314 - A large volcano on the North Island later known as Te Ika-a-Maui spat out a small cloud and then settled back to dormancy.

Within the next five years waves of Polynesians would begin to arrive by canoe, establishing a traditional Maori culture on the islands. They were a large thriving community by the time that the Dutch seafarer, explorer, and merchant Abel Tasman arrived in 1642.

The Dutch named the islands Nieuw-Zeeland, but their futile settle attempts and also the incursions of the French were overtaken by the power of the Royal Navy. With this naval supremacy, Great Britain exercised control over the region but not the land. With the unequal Treaty of Waitangi, the Maori's retained their land ownership and became British citizens.

A flagstaff donated by Chief Hone Heke was erected at Kororareka to symbolize British sovereignty. Unfortunately, Great Britain had not acted in good faith; one area of dispute was moving the capital away from Kororareka and introducing tariffs, two measures that hit the Maori economy. A series of wars followed in which British troops ultimately failed to subdue the Maoris. An icon of the bloody conflict was Chief Hone Heke challenging colonial authority by chopping down the flagstaff - this hated symbol of dishonour was not to be erected again.

Another key figure in this tragic era was James Busby, the British Resident in New Zealand. He had been appointed in response to complaints from missionaries and a petition from Maori chiefs calling for King William IV to be a "friend and guardian" of New Zealand. A broad-minded individual, Busby served as New Zealand's first jurist and the "originator of law in Aotearoa." Respecting the fearless military strength of the Maoris, he strongly argued for Auckland Separation along the natural dividing line of the Bombay Hills.

This argument for shared sovereignty prevailed because the British wanted trade more than settlement. A statue of Busby dominated the skyline of the Auckland Super-city State for decades. But tragically this entire region would be devastated by volcanic eruption. The rebuilt metropolis would be known as "Akarana," the Maori transliteration of Auckland. The old statue would be replaced by a binary image of Busby reaching out a hand of friendship to Hone Heke. Today this peaceful bastion of liberalism dominates the modern world long after Great Britain was destroyed by the nuclear fires of World War III.

Author's Note:

In reality, the Kaharoa eruption was staged at seven vents aligned along an 8-km- long zone and lava extrusion may have persisted for around four to five years years, eventually erupting about 5 km 3 of the magma. The ash thrown from this event may have affected temperatures around the globe and precipitated the Great Famine of 1315-17 in Europe. It would later be followed by the 1886 eruption of Mount Tarawera, the deadliest eruption in New Zealand since the arrival of Europeans. Around 120 people were killed, and many settlements were destroyed or buried.

Provine's Addendum:

While the Maori peoples thrived on the North Island in the fourteenth century, Europeans suffered a terrible calamity from the Black Death. Gradual climatic change brought on weaker harvests, slowing population growth that had been enjoyed for centuries. The sudden arrival of plague shocked the continent with deaths of more than one-third of the population. Governments, supported by religious fervor, reacted with new waves of cracking down on supposed causes, such as witchcraft. As the crisis waned, populations began to reject unquestioned absolutism, ushering in an era of increased individualism. (In reality, the Great Famine had already weakened Europeans' faiths in government and the Roman Catholic Church due to years of struggle.)