The Otaheite Dog, The Kuri or Maori Dog

 

Above: Otaheite Dog, Charles Catton's Animals (1788) (c)2023 Canid Study

Description:

Otaheite Dog

The Otaheite Dog is probably the dog Maori brought to New Zealand.
Otaheite Dog

Image From:

Kuri, Maori or native dog. Dominion Museum collection.

Addional Notes:

The Maori dog (kuri) was not indigenous to New Zealand but was probably introduced during the period of the Great Migration (c. 1350 A.D. ). Although little is known of its distribution, it seems evident that the breed failed to establish itself to any great degree. It became extinct some years after the arrival of the European settlers.

The Maori dog was a small, low-set animal, very ugly in appearance. Although it had a poor sense of smell, it was of some use in hunting night moving birds such as the kiwi and also ducks in the moulting season.

Above: Native dog "Double canoes. Tipaerua." Society Islands, probably during Captain Cook's first voyage. From the British Museum's collection of drawings by A. Buchan, S. Parkinson and J. F. Miller, made in the countries visited by Captain Cook in his first voyage (1768-71), also of prints published in John Hawksworth's Voyages of Biron, Wallis and Cook, 1773, as well as in Cook 's second and third voyages (1762-5, 1776-80)

The Frenchman Crozet, who was at the Bay of Islands in June 1772, noted that: “The dogs are a sort of domesticated fox, quite black or white, very low on the legs, straight ears, thick tail, long body, full jaws, but more pointed than those of the fox, and uttering the same cry; they do not bark like our dogs”.

According to Hutton, the dog was dull, lazy, and sullen in disposition. Yet it is credited with being a plaything or favourite of Maori women who regarded it with affection.

Above: The Kuri, Maori or native dog Dominion Museum Collection

   

The dog's carcass was put to a variety of uses. The flesh was considered a delicacy, the hair was used for ornaments and the adornment of weapons, the teeth served as ear pendants, and the skin for cloaks. These were made of skins either sewn together or else attached in strips to a piece of woven flax fibre.