Recipients

2024 recipients

• Jacinta Beckwith (University of Otago). To explore Kaupapa Māori archaeology's contribution to the health and wellbeing of Māori coastal communities.
• Pio Manoa (University of Otago). To conduct a comprehensive archaeological field investigation of southeast Vanua Levu, focusing primarily on early human settlement, interaction, and the long-term development of Fijian culture.

2023 recipients

• Adele Filippi (University of Otago) “Early Māori Subsistence and Medicine – an examination of phytoliths in wild native plants from Aotearoa” from the archaeological record.
• Hinekura Smith (Unitec) “He Kahu Korero – Cloaks that Speak” to travel to interview and observe Niuean artist Cora-Allen Wickliffe engaged in her practice of bark cloth – specifically baby and children’s traditional clothing created for ceremony – as part of a wider study to theorise a relationship between Māori, Aboriginal and Pacific women’s traditional clothing making as revitalising cultural pedagogy.
• Meriam van Os (University of Otago) “Extension of the commensal model to study human migratory and mobility patterns in Aotearoa (New Zealand)” studying migration by analysing the DNA of early Māori companion animals, kurī (dogs), from palaeofaeces.

2022 recipients

• Benjamin Jones (University of Auckland) to conduct a pilot study involving recording and sampling eroding middens along Ruakaka Beach, south of Marsden Point, Northland.
• Patricia Pillay (University of Auckland) to address the nature of human-bird interactions on Nuku Hiva, the largest Marquesan Island, over time.
• Dr Patricia Wallace (University of Canterbury) to examine a Cook collected dogskin cloak in Gisborne, before it is packed for its inevitable return to the British Museum.
• Dr Ross Ramsay (Collaboration with the University of Otago) to undertake mineral composition and rock chemistry research on pieces of scoria found in a Māori occupation site at Tiwai, Southland.

2021 recipients

• Isaac McIvor (University of Waikato) to address the question of when and why Māori began fortifying settlements, known as pā, some 200 to 300 years after first migration to Aotearoa New Zealand
• Robyn Kramer (University of Otago) to establish an open-access, accurate baseline 87Sr/86Sr isoscape for Aotearoa to be used in scientific research.

2020 recipients

• Josie Hagan, InSitu Heritage, "Cultural Mapping Whareongaonga 5 Blocks, Gisborne".
• Jeanette Wikaira, University of Otago, "He taonga, hei taonga: An exploration of taonga and Māori wellbeing".
• Brendan Kneebone, CFG Heritage, "Motutapu Island Greywacke".
• John Middleton, University of Auckland, "Exploring the distribution of Phrases in the Tokelau Language".

2019 recipients

• Arthur Grainger, University of Otago, “Research focussing on the nature of human colonisation of the western Pacific by analysing the ceramic production of the early colonisers of the Marianas Islands”.
• Nelissa Ling, University of Otago, “Study focuses beyond the Austronesians in the Pacific to areas of mainland Asia where ancestral Austronesians came from. It will explore how MetS has evolved between Asia and the Pacific in response to varying local conditions, including both the cultural and physical environments, through time”
• Robert Henderson, University of Otago, “Faunal analysis of the assemblage form the Arawes providing an excellent opportunity to gain greater insight into Early Lapita subsistence, and the role of introduced animals during this period”.
• Leteisha Lamb, University of Otago, “A geochemical study on the otoliths of bonefishes collected from an archaeological sequence at Moturakau Rockshelter, on Aitutaki Island in the Cook Islands dating back to ca. the 11th to 13th century”.
• Brendan Kneebone, University of Auckland, "An investigation into the archaeological use of greywacke stone (including identifying and characterising its natural source locations) from the Auckland region”.
• Sindy Luu, University of Otago, “The application of plant residue analyses and ancient DNA techniques in the interpretation of prehistoric subsistence and the development of social complexity”.
• Brooke Tucker, New Zealand Archeological Assn, Funding for inventory of two significant, but unstudied, archaeological assemblages curated by Rakiura Museum.
• Ross Ramsay, Southern Institute of Technology, Research into sourcing three shaped scoria blocks found in early Māori occupation sites to a particular island in the Hawaiki Zone.

2018 recipients

• Darby Filimoehala, University of Auckland, "The Archaeological Investigation of Traditional Marine Resource Management in Ka 'ūpūlehu Ahupua'a, Island of Hawai'i." 
• Jacinta Forde, "Ngā Taonga Toheroa: The significance and management of Toheroa in the Māori world."
• Melandri Vlok, University of Otago, "The Impact of Human Interaction on the Prevalence of Infectious and Nutritional Diseases in Asia."
• Patricia Pillay, University of Auckland, "Paleoenvironmental Reconstruction using Modern Shellfish to Understand Māori Shellfish Scheduling and Seasonality Patterns in New Zealand."

2017 recipients

• Huia Pacey and Matt Schmidt, for research entitled “Heritage New Zealand Pouhere Taonga Radiocarbon dating of two detached fragments of raranga found in a remote cave in the Roxburgh Gorge”
• Tristan Wadsworth nad Katherien Watson, for research entitled "Underground overground archaeology post-excavation ananlsis of material recovered duirng thier excavation at Waitata/Little Port cooper in Banks Peninsula."
• Shar Briden, for research entitled “Absolute Archaeology Ltd Excavation of Ōkia Flat archaeological sites, Papanui Inlet, Otago Peninsula”
• Charles Radclyffe, for research entitled “Archaeological fieldwork in Solomon Islands”
• Matt Ryan, for research entitled “Paleoenvironmental analysis of the Okoropunga stone rows in the Wairarapa”

2016 recipients

• Chris Jennings, University of Queensland, for research entitled “Investigation of the prehistoric quarries of the greater Bluff area in relation to the organisation of raw material procurement and adze manufacture”
• Tautala Asaua-Pisa, University of Otago, for research entitled “The archaeological investigation of Apolima Island, Sāmoa: the construction of a 2500 year cultural sequence”
• Rachel Scott, University of Otago, for research entitled “Investigation of  the dietary differences between individuals interred within two burial mounds at ‘Atele on the island of Tongatapu, the Kingdom of Tonga, using dental microwear texture analysis”
• Gareth Walter, University of Auckland, for research entitled “An archaeological survey of the monumental architecture present in the Maungaroa Valley, Rarotonga (Cook Islands)”
• Dylan Gaffney, University of Otago, for research entitled “Early Austronesian interactions with the New Guinea Highlands: evidence from the geochemical analysis of archaeological pottery”

2015

• Dylan Gaffney
• Jessie Hurford

2014

• Andrew Brown
• Helen Gilmore
• Sophie Miller
• Joe Mills
• Erica Newman
• Hineraumoa Te Apatu
• Monica Tromp

2013

• Jonathan Carpenter
• Laura Dawson
• Christina Stantis

2012

• Karen Greig
• Jennifer Huebert
• Kevin Jones
• Rebecca Kinaston

2011

• Julie Broszniowski
• Ella Ussher

2010

• Arden Cruickshank
• Peter Wilberfoss
• Annette Wilkes

2009

• Aimee Foster
• Laura Pick
• Ben Shaw

2008

• James Robinson
• Mara Mulrooney
• Erin Williams and Chris Jennings

2007

• Rachel Fuller
• Mara Mulrooney
• Kasey Robb
• Catherine Smith

2006

• Phillip Moore
• Gerard O’Regan
• Alice Storey

2005

• Jacinta Beckwith
• Tony Fiske
• Andrew McAlister
• Alice Storey

2004

• Takuya Nagaoka
• Matthew Campbell

2003

• Tanya Ramezanian-Abhari

2002

• Louise Furey and Brenda Sewell
• Takuya Nagaoka

2001

• Hamish Gordon
• Angela Middleton
• Takuya Nagaoka

2000

• Emma Brooks
• Alaric Nicholls
• Senka Vrbancic
• Tim Thomas
• Patricia Wallace

1999

• Catherine Gudgeon
• Elaine Rush

1998

• Angela Middleton
• James Samson
• Senka Vrbancic

1997

• Claire Reeler
• Takuya Nagaoka