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The Ashburton County occupies all the country between the Rakaia and Rangitata, two of Canterbury’s largest rivers, and takes its name from a third river which flows almost parallel to the others and midway between them. Topographically, the county falls into two distinct parts: an almost featureless coastal plain and to the north-west, in marked contrast, a highland region of mountains, glaciers and river basins. The plain, forty miles long by thirty-six wide, contains rather more than half of the 2367 square miles of the county. In the high country, the boundaries are closer—little more than twenty-five miles distant at one point. Then they move apart again, up the Mathias River in the north and the Havelock and Forbes rivers in the west.

In its original state the greater part of the plain was arid except for a coastal region of heavy swamp south of the Ashburton River. There was little about it to attract the attention of the few Maori inhabitants of southern New Zealand. They journeyed as rapidly as possible along the coast between the villages of Taumoto, at the entrance to Lake Ellesmere in the north and Arowhenua, south of the Rangitata River. Occasionally they camped for eeling on the banks of the Hakatere (Ashburton) River, and this stream formed the boundary between the territories of the two villages. Other Maori trails passed along the foothills and across the high river basins further inland. Native artifacts have been discovered at widely scattered localities; they