Point Britomart () was a

headland A headland, also known as a head, is a coastal landform, a point of land usually high and often with a sheer drop, that extends into a body of water. It is a type of promontory. A headland of considerable size often is called a cape.Whittow, Jo ...

in the

Waitematā Harbour The Waitematā Harbour is the main access by sea to Auckland, New Zealand. The harbour forms the northern and eastern coasts of the Auckland isthmus and is crossed by the Auckland Harbour Bridge. It is matched on the southern side of the city ...

, in

Auckland Auckland ( ; ) is a large metropolitan city in the North Island of New Zealand. It has an urban population of about It is located in the greater Auckland Region, the area governed by Auckland Council, which includes outlying rural areas and ...

(), New Zealand. Located between

Commercial Bay Commercial Bay () was a historic bay on the southern side of the Waitematā Harbour that defined the original extent of the Auckland waterfront in Auckland, New Zealand. Today, the name Commercial Bay refers to the heavily developed area aroun ...

and

Official Bay An official is someone who holds an office (function or mandate, regardless of whether it carries an actual working space with it) in an organization or government and participates in the exercise of authority (either their own or that of thei ...

,Auckland's waterfront and its changing face
(Auckland City Library, includes various further references) the point was later

quarried A quarry is a type of open-pit mining, open-pit mine in which dimension stone, rock (geology), rock, construction aggregate, riprap, sand, gravel, or slate is excavated from the ground. The operation of quarries is regulated in some juri ...

away to produce fill for

land reclamation Land reclamation, often known as reclamation, and also known as land fill (not to be confused with a waste landfill), is the process of creating new Terrestrial ecoregion, land from oceans, list of seas, seas, Stream bed, riverbeds or lake ...

Mechanics Bay Mechanics Bay () is a Land reclamation, reclaimed bay on the Waitematā Harbour in Auckland, New Zealand. It is also the name of the area of the former bay that is now mainly occupied by commercial and port facilities. Sometimes the bay for ...

, and almost no physical trace remains at street level in what is today an area of the

Auckland CBD The Auckland Central Business District (CBD), or Auckland city centre, is the geographical and economic heart of the Auckland, Auckland metropolitan area. It is the area in which Auckland was established in 1840, by William Hobson on land gifted ...

and the

Auckland waterfront The Auckland waterfront (rarely the Auckland harbourfront) is a city-side stretch of the southern Waitematā Harbour coastline in Auckland, New Zealand. Previously mostly dominated by Ports of Auckland uses, from the 2000s on it is becoming i ...

History

''Te Rerenga Ora Iti'' (‘the leap of the few survivors’) was the site of at least one Māori , and was considered an important site in ''Tāmaki Makaurau'' (

Auckland isthmus The Auckland isthmus, also known as the Tāmaki isthmus, is a narrow stretch of land on the North Island of New Zealand in the Auckland Region, and the location of the central suburbs of the city of Auckland and the central business district. ...

), with several known battles fought over it, such as by the

Ngāti Whātua Ngāti Whātua is a Māori iwi (tribe) of the lower Northland Peninsula of New Zealand's North Island. It comprises a confederation of four hapū (subtribes) interconnected both by ancestry and by association over time: Te Uri-o-Hau, Te Roroa ...

iwi Iwi () are the largest social units in New Zealand Māori society. In Māori, roughly means or , and is often translated as "tribe". The word is both singular and plural in the Māori language, and is typically pluralised as such in English. ...

'' in the 17th and 18th centuries. The name commemorates an incident around 1680 when Ngāti Whātua drove Ngāti Huarere over the cliff to either their freedom or deaths.Chapter 1 - The Historic Land 1600-1959
(from the

Britomart Transport Centre Britomart Station, officially Waitematā railway station, and formerly known as Britomart Transport Centre, is the public transport hub in the central business district of Auckland and the northern terminus of the North Island Main Trunk rai ...

website) After signing the

Treaty of Waitangi The Treaty of Waitangi (), sometimes referred to as ''Te Tiriti'', is a document of central importance to the history of New Zealand, Constitution of New Zealand, its constitution, and its national mythos. It has played a major role in the tr ...

, Ngāti Whātua paramount chief

Āpihai Te Kawau Apihai Te Kawau (died November 1869) was a paramount chief of the Ngāti Whātua Māori iwi (tribe) of Auckland (), New Zealand in the 19th century. Te Kawau's father was Tarahawaiki and his grandfather was Tūperiri, the principal leader o ...

, gave land for British settlement on the Waitematā. It was ''Te Rerenga Ora Iti'' where the

Union Jack The Union Jack or Union Flag is the ''de facto'' national flag of the United Kingdom. The Union Jack was also used as the official flag of several British colonies and dominions before they adopted their own national flags. It is sometimes a ...

was first raised in Auckland on 18 September 1840 by

Felton Mathew Felton Mathew (1801 – 26 November 1847) was New Zealand's first Surveyor General. Central Auckland was laid out by him. Felton Mathew Avenue was named after him, and is a difficult incline amongst the cycling community in Auckland. Early life ...

, and the point soon became the site of one of the first British military fortifications in New Zealand,

Fort Britomart A fortification (also called a fort, fortress, fastness, or stronghold) is a military construction designed for the defense of territories in warfare, and is used to establish rule in a region during peacetime. The term is derived from Lati ...

. It was also the site of Auckland's first church,

St Paul's St Paul's Cathedral, formally the Cathedral Church of St Paul the Apostle, is an Anglican cathedral in London, England, the seat of the Bishop of London. The cathedral serves as the mother church of the Diocese of London in the Church of Engl ...

, founded within a year of the foundation of Auckland in 1841, and one of the city's best known landmarks for 40 years. The point received its European name in 1848 from , the crew of which undertook a detailed survey of the harbour of the new capital. From 1842, Point Britomart became the first major military barracks in Auckland. This was supplemented by the construction of the larger

Albert Barracks The Albert Barracks was a major British military installation that overlooked Auckland, New Zealand, from the mid-1840s to 1870, during the city's early colonial period. The perimeter wall was built between 1846 and the early 1850s, in the area ...

in 1846. Fort Britomart and the Albert Barracks were closed in 1870. In the 1870s and 1880s, the point was quarried away for fill in Mechanics Bay, its spoils providing the land for a new railway station. The removal also made Official Bay more easily accessible by foot. Despite being set back from the excavations, on what is now known as Emily Place, the original St Paul's had to be demolished. The western half of the city block currently bound by Tangihua Street, Beach Road, Quay Street and Britomart Place, now occupies the site of what was once the northern tip of Point Britomart. In 2018

Ngāti Whātua-o-Ōrākei Iwi () are the largest social units in New Zealand Māori society. In Māori, roughly means or , and is often translated as "tribe". The word is both singular and plural in the Māori language, and is typically pluralised as such in English. ...

and

Ports of Auckland Port of Auckland Limited (POAL), the successor to the Auckland Harbour Board, is the Auckland Council-owned company administering Auckland's commercial freight and cruise ship harbour facilities. As the company operates all of the associated fac ...

created ''Te Toka o Apihai Te Kawau'', a memorial commemorating the founding of Auckland that includes a rock which marks the spot where ''Rerenga Ora Iti'' met the water, and where the city began.

References

{{Coord, -36.844049, 174.772178, display=title, format=dms Britomart Geography of Auckland Auckland CBD Auckland waterfront Waitematā Harbour