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Tamati Waka Nene was probably born in the 1780s. He was the
second son of Tapua, leader and tohunga of Ngāti Hao of Hokianga, and the
younger brother of Eruera Maihi Patuone. His mother
was Te Kawehau. By the mid-1830s Nene had converted to the Wesleyan
faith and was baptised in 1839, taking the name Tamati Waka, after
Thomas Walker, an English merchant patron of the Church Missionary
Society.1 Tamati Waka Nene
lived in the Hokianga when it was a thriving and prosperous trading
society and was said to have been an astute businessman and kindly
by nature. Nene saw the advantages of having Pākehā shipping
traders in the area, and helped settlers as well as Wesleyan
missionaries establish themselves there in 1827.
Tamati Waka Nene died on 4 August 1871 and was buried, at his
own request, in a churchyard in the Bay of Islands. In 1873 Lord
Bowen unveiled a memorial stone to him carved from Oamaru stone
with a Greek Cross.
It is likely that Lindauer based this portrait on a photograph
by John Crombie who was commissioned to produce 12 photographic
portraits of Māori chiefs for the London Illustrated
News. In Lindauer's notebook this portrait is numbered #6 with
an inscription saying 'for Mr Partridge'. Nene's portrait was
painted in 1890.2
NM
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