By the fourteenth century migrations associated with some of the famous ancestral canoes had begun to influence the Mahurangi area. These migrants conquered and absorbed the Maru iwi and the descendants of Toi. From the North came the Ngai Tahuhu people, the descendants of Tahuhu. From the south came the descendants of Tainui waka who had settled around the Waitemata Harbour. These people, who also had Arawa affiliations, had by the sixteenth century become known by the general name Ngaoho. They had intermarried with the earlier tribal groups, including Ngai Tahuhu who they pushed to the north, and were in occupation of all the land between the Waikato River and the Kaipara Harbour entrance, including Mahurangi.

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The Kawerau people (are) descended from a large group of Ngati Awa people who had migrated north to the Tamaki isthmus from Kawhia in the 1620's. Led by Maki, the most famous ancestor of the Mahurangi people they initially settled at Rarotonga (Mt Smart). Then over the next generation they spread northward conquering the islands of the Hauraki Gulf north to Hauturu (Little Barrier Island), the Kaipara district north to the harbour entrance, as well as the east coast from Takapuna to Te Arai. This conquest included Mahurangi, where the people of Ngaoho and Ngai Tahuhu were defeated and absorbed.

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Maki had four sons Manuhiri, Maraeariki, Ngawhetu and Tawhiakiterangi. These children all had associations with the Mahurangi. Manuhiri has upheld and maintained the customary rights and principles since then to present day. Ngati Manuhiri has strong links to the confederation of tribes known as Te Kawerau who descend from Maki and his children.