Nine species of moa, flightless birds, the largest of which, the South Island giant moa, stood up to 3.6 metres tall and weighed 230 kilograms, lived in New Zealand before people arrived. When Polynesian settlers, the ancestors of the Maori, reached the islands around 1280, they hunted the moa for meat and burned forests, and radiocarbon dating of bones and egg shells suggests that all species were gone within about 100 to 150 years, by around 1400. Haast's eagle, the huge raptor that preyed on the moa, died out soon afterwards. It is among the fastest extinctions of megafauna caused by humans.
Before and after
- from 14th century to 17th centuryRenaissance
- 14th centuryPublication of Water Margin
- from 14th century to 16th centuryRise of Devotio Moderna
- 1400Birth of Johannes Gutenberg
- c. 1400sThe moa are hunted to extinction in New Zealand
- 25 October 1400Death of Geoffrey Chaucer
- 15th centuryConstruction of Santa Maria delle Grazie
- 1402Construction of Charles Bridge
- 1402Construction of Seville Cathedral
More in Evolution & life
- from 56th century BCE to 20th century BCESumer
- from 3rd millennium BCE to 2nd millenniumMaya civilization
- from 600 CE to 900 CEWari
- from 13 September 622 CE to 27 September 622 CEHijra
- from 800 CE to 1600Mississippian culture
- from 1200 to 1523Aztec
The era
This moment belongs to the Medieval world (500 CE to 1500 CE), kingdoms, faiths and trade routes. You can also browse everything in the 14th century.