The Origins of New Zealand

New Zealand was part of a much larger continent called Zalandia. Between then and now 93% of it got submerged, leaving behind the distinctive shape of the land that we know today. It's not fully known how or why this submerging happened but is theorised to have been caused by an eruption of Taupo volcano. New Zealand is what we might call a biological arc, on account of all the weird and wonderful things that are here and have been cut off from the wider world due to early separation.