What is "tainui"

Tainui is a tribal waka confederation of New Zealand Māori iwi. The Tainui confederation comprises four principal related Māori iwi of the central North Island of New Zealand: Hauraki, Ngāti Maniapoto, Ngāti Raukawa and Waikato. These iwi share a common ancestry from Polynesian migrants who arrived in New Zealand on the Tainui waka, which voyaged across the Pacific Ocean from Hawaiki to Aotearoa (North Island) approximately 800 years ago. According to Pei Te Hurinui Jones, the Tainui historian, Tainui first entered the Waikato about 1400 bringing with them kumara plants. By about 1450 they had conquered the last of the indigenous people in a battle at Atiamuri.

In Māori tradition, Tainui was one of the great ocean-going canoes in which Polynesians migrated to New Zealand approximately 800 years ago. The Tainui waka was named for an infant who did not survive childbirth. At the burial site of this child, at a place in Hawaiki known then as Maungaroa, a great tree grew; this was the tree that was used to build the ocean canoe.

Tainui was a New Zealand parliamentary Māori electorate. From the 2008 election the Hauraki-Waikato electorate replaced it.

It was held by Nanaia Mahuta MP from 2002 to 2008.

Tainui may refer to:

• Tainui, a confederation of Māori iwi (tribes) in New Zealand
  • Waikato (iwi), (often referred to as "Tainui") a constituent tribe of the abovementioned confederation
• Tainui (canoe), a Māori waka (migration canoe)
• Tainui, New Zealand, a suburb of Dunedin
• Tainui (New Zealand electorate), a former parliamentary Māori electorate.