Percy Smith

Stephenson Percy Smith (11 June 1840 – 19 April 1922) was a New Zealand ethnologist and surveyor. He researched and wrote about the origins of the Māori people and was one of the founders of the Polynesian Society. ) on 23 April 1863. They had four children.

His entry in the Dictionary of New Zealand Biography (1993) says "In some areas, particularly his account of the origins of the Maori and their arrival in New Zealand, Smith's interpretation has not survived the light cast on it by later historical and archaeological research. Scholars have criticised Smith's use of his source materials and his editing of Maori traditions for publication.... Smith's careers in surveying and ethnology were characterised by hard work and dedication, and he received recognition for both in his lifetime. Although it is now generally accepted that much of his work on the Maori is unreliable, his research nevertheless provided a basis for the development of professional ethnology in New Zealand. As a successful civil servant and respected scholar he was perhaps one of New Zealand's most prolific intellectuals of the late nineteenth century, and was a major contributor to the scientific debate over the origins and nature of the Maori".

Rāwiri Taonui, writing in Te Ara: The Encyclopedia of New Zealand in 2005, accused Smith of false attribution: "The Great Fleet theory was the result of a collaboration between the 19th-century ethnologist S. Percy Smith and the Māori scholar Hoani Te Whatahoro Jury. Smith obtained details about places in Rarotonga and Tahiti during a visit in 1897, while Jury provided information about Māori canoes in New Zealand. Smith then 'cut and pasted' his material, combining several oral traditions into new ones. Their joint work was published in two books, in which Jury and Smith falsely attributed much of their information to two 19th-century tohunga, Moihi Te Mātorohanga and Nēpia Pōhūhū".

Smith's translation of Hoani Te Whatahoro Jury's book, The Lore of the Whare-Wananga, published in 1913, was selected as one of the 180 most significant works of Māori-authored non-fiction.

Percy Smith Medal After the award of the Hector Medal and prize money to Smith in 1920, he retained half of the money, 20 pounds, and sent the rest to Harry Skinner as a gift. Skinner had just been given the position of lecturer in anthropology at the University of Otago in Dunedin, an appointment which signalled the first academic recognition of the discipline in the country. Skinner decided that the money should be used to fund the Percy Smith Medal in honour of his work, in particular the foundation of the Polynesian Society. He gave the money to the university, who doubled it and let it accumulate at compound interest, deciding that it should be awarded every four years, with the recipient receiving half of the accumulated interest. The award was given for a published work in anthropology by a member or former member of staff of either Otago University or Otago Museum.

The medal is bronze, around in diameter, with a portrait of Smith on the obverse and, on the reverse side, "University of Otago. For research in Anthropology". 1956: J.D. Freeman, W.R. Geddes, L.Lockerbie 1960: H. B. Hawthorn 1965: T.T. Barrow 1970: None 1978: Foss Leach

Major works Smith's major works include: The peopling of the North: notes on the ancient Maori history of the northern peninsula and sketches of the history of the Ngati-Whatua tribe of the Kaipara, New Zealand (1898) Hawaiki: the whence of the Māori (1898) Wars of the northern against the southern tribes of New Zealand in the nineteenth century (1904) History and traditions of the Māoris of the West Coast, North Island of New Zealand prior to 1840 (1910) The lore of the whare-wānanga (1913–15)

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