The Treaty of Waitangi is the founding document of the nation of New Zealand. It was signed in the Bay of Islands on 6 February 1840 by Captain William Hobson, several English residents and approximately 45 Maori chiefs.

The 1893 Women's Suffrage Petition led to New Zealand becoming the first self-governing nation in the world where women won the right to vote.

The collection is one of the most complete and unique sets of original documents of the International Military Tribunal Far East (IMTFE) 1946-1948.

Sir George Grey (twice Governor of New Zealand), a soldier, explorer, politician, philanthropist, and linguist donated his substantial manuscript, book collection and personal papers to the citizens of Auckland.

The item is the manuscript score of Douglas Lilburn’s Overture Aotearoa; an overture for orchestra written in 1940, while Lilburn was a student in London at the Royal College of Music.

The National Film Unit’s ‘Weekly Review’ and ‘Pictorial Parade’ film series captured a wide variety of news and general interest stories, and contributed to the cultural identity of mid-twentieth century New Zealand.

The Māori Land Court minute books, 1862-1900, are a record of the hearings and evidence given to establish the Native Land Court titles across New Zealand. They record tribal history, whakapapa (genealogy) and evidence of iwi/hapu (tribes and sub-tribes) use and occupation of land.

The documentary PATU! records a watershed moment in New Zealand history. The 1981 Springbok Tour to New Zealand divided the country in two (you were either for the tour, or you were against it) and marked the largest and most sustained period of civil disobedience in our recent history.

Edmund Hillary KG, ONZ, KBE (1919-2008), renowned New Zealand mountaineer, explorer, environmentalist and philanthropist, bequeathed his personal archive of papers, photographs and documents to Auckland Museum.  In 1953 Hillary captured the world's imagination by conquering Everest and went on to explore places where no man had been before.

As New Zealand’s national anthem, sung at every official and sporting occasion, God Defend New Zealand is one of our most powerful symbols of national identity.

Charles Orwell Brasch (1909-1973) was a poet, editor and patron of the arts who played a key role in the development of a distinctive New Zealand literary and arts culture. He was the founding editor of the literary journalLandfall and gave professional and personal support to many New Zealand writers and artists.

2015 is the bi-centenary of the publication, A Korao no New Zealand, or, the New Zealander's first book:being an attempt to compose some lessons for the instruction of the natives, the first printed publication in Māori.

The New Zealand Oral History collection 1946-1948 is a preeminent collection of broadcast oral histories recorded around regional New Zealand after the Second World War by the New Zealand Broadcasting Service’s Mobile Unit.

This collection of records acquired by Hocken from the Church Missionary Society in London contains the letters and journals of Rev Samuel Marsden and the settlers who came to New Zealand in 1814 to begin establishing missionary settlements.

Doctors Henry Percival (1879-1956) and Cecily Pickerill (1903-1988) pioneered significant developments in facial plastic surgery especially for soldiers wounded in warfare, and for children with cleft palate and hare lip deformities.

He Whakaputanga o te Rangatiratanga o Nu Tireni – known in English as the Declaration of Independence of the United Tribes of New Zealand – is a constitutional document of historical and cultural significance.

Katherine Mansfield (the pseudonym of Kathleen Beauchamp, 1888-1923) is New Zealand's most significant and enduringly famous writer.  She wrote poetry and reviews, and worked in an editorial capacity for some of London's most ground-breaking avant-garde literary journals, but most importantly wrote short stories, for which she gained an international reputation.

The Waipu collection documents a significant microcosm of international migration from Scotland to Nova Scotia, to Australia, and to New Zealand, reflecting the spread of the British Empire of the time, and the movement of its people.

Lancelot Eric Richdale's papers document his internationally recognised contributions to ornithological knowledge and conservation.

The Sir John Logan Campbell papers provide a resource for the study of Auckland and New Zealand business and social history during the 19th Century.