Young Nick's Head is a headland at the southern end of Poverty Bay

Poverty Bay

Poverty Bay is the largest of several small bays on the east coast of New Zealand's North Island to the north of Hawkes Bay. It stretches for 10 kilometres from Young Nick's Head in the southwest to Tuaheni Point in the northeast. The city of Gisborne is located on the northern shore of the bay...

 in New Zealand

New Zealand

New Zealand is an island country in the south-western Pacific Ocean comprising two main landmasses and numerous smaller islands. The country is situated some east of Australia across the Tasman Sea, and roughly south of the Pacific island nations of New Caledonia, Fiji, and Tonga...

's North Island

North Island

The North Island is one of the two main islands of New Zealand, separated from the much less populous South Island by Cook Strait. The island is in area, making it the world's 14th-largest island...

. It is clearly visible from the nearby city of Gisborne

Gisborne, New Zealand

-Economy:The harbour was host to many ships in the past and had developed as a river port to provide a more secure location for shipping compared with the open roadstead of Poverty Bay which can be exposed to southerly swells. A meat works was sited beside the harbour and meat and wool was shipped...

.

The promontory

Promontory

Promontory may refer to:*Promontory, a prominent mass of land which overlooks lower lying land or a body of water*Promontory, Utah, the location where the United States first Transcontinental Railroad was completed...

 was the first land sighted by the crew of Capt. James Cook

James Cook

Captain James Cook, FRS, RN was a British explorer, navigator and cartographer who ultimately rose to the rank of captain in the Royal Navy...

's ship, Endeavour

HM Bark Endeavour

HMS Endeavour, also known as HM Bark Endeavour, was a British Royal Navy research vessel commanded by Lieutenant James Cook on his first voyage of discovery, to Australia and New Zealand from 1769 to 1771....

on October 7, 1769, Cook having promised a reward to the first crewman to sight land. This reward was delivered to 12-year-old Nicholas Young, assistant to the ship's surgeon, in the form of a gallon of rum and the name of the headland.

In Maori the promontory is named Te Kuri o Paoa, or in its English translation "The Dog of Paoa" as the shape of the headlands looked like the dog of the famous Maori explorer Paoa.