SPELLING OF WHANGAREI
. Sit,-A correspondent in your issue of February 19 instances the mispro‘nunciation of Whangarei (Wonggaree). It may be only of academic interest now, but there seems to be very good evidence that the correct. spelling should be Wangare (Wa-nga-ree). The early missionaries, after listening intently to the Maoris, spelt place-names as nearly as they could phonetically. Thus Marsden spells this place Wangaree; Hall, Whangaddee; D’Urville, Wangari; a Church missionary map of 1836 hag the same. spelling. When our family settled at Whangarei in 1887, and for the eight succeeding years that I lived there, I never heard it pronounced other than Wa-nga-ree, or (admittedly incorrectly) Wanggaree — never with the © initial "wha" or the final "ray" sound. For years after the missionary period the New Zealand Herald and the Auckland Weekly News spelt it Wangari. It would be interesting to Know when and by whose authority the present spelling of the town was adopted.
A. H.
REED
(Dunedin).
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https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/periodicals/NZLIST19540319.2.12.5
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New Zealand Listener, Volume 30, Issue 765, 19 March 1954, Page 5
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159SPELLING OF WHANGAREI New Zealand Listener, Volume 30, Issue 765, 19 March 1954, Page 5
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