Australia was the last to be discovered. History of Australia, briefly: discovery, exploration of the mainland and settlement by the British. Man and his purpose

There is still debate in the world about who discovered Australia. Some claim that this is James Cook, a navigator from England. Others believe that the discoverers of the continent were the Danes, looking for a way to their colony in Java.

In general, they appeared here long before the Europeans. More than forty thousand years ago, this continent was chosen by people from the southern regions of Asia. The mysterious terra incognita australius (unknown southern land) - ancient geographers still knew about it. Already in the fifteenth century, they marked a mysterious continent on maps. True, the outlines of this vast land area on them do not in any way resemble the real Australia.

The Portuguese also enter into the debate about who discovered Australia, claiming that Portuguese sailors received information about the new continent back in the sixteenth century from the aborigines of the Malay Islands, who caught sea cucumbers in the coastal waters of an unknown continent. But the first European set foot on Australian soil only in the seventeenth century.

The history of the discovery of Australia has long been associated with the name of Cook, but still the Dutch are considered the first inhabitants of Europe to visit the green continent (as Australia is sometimes called). It is not for nothing that the western part of this amazing continent later became known as New Holland.

In 1605, Willem Janszoon from Holland, who crossed sailed along the Cape York Peninsula. A year after this, Torres from Spain discovered the strait that separates the island from the continent. In 1642, the Dane visited the southwestern part of Tasmania, considering it part of Australia. Both Janszon and Tasman met Aboriginal people on the mainland.

And the Dutch, and the Spaniards, and the Danes did not publicly announce the discovery of a new continent. It is precisely because of the secrecy of the discoverers that the question of who discovered Australia is now disputed by the British, who came to this land 150 years after the first Europeans.

In 1770, the ships of James Cook landed on the east coast of Australia, who immediately proclaimed the new lands as English possessions. Soon a royal “penal colony” was created here for criminal elements, and a little later for English political exiles.

In 1788, the British, who arrived with the “first fleet” on Australian soil, founded the city of Sydney, which later became the center of the British colony. The first free settlers arrived with the “second fleet” and began to energetically explore the expanses of the green continent.

The continent, originally called “New Holland”, by the end of the 18th and beginning of the 19th centuries, with the light hand of the English hydrographer Flinders, began to be called “Australia”. The Aborigines by this time had been brutally exterminated by the colonialists. There were raids and hunts, the natives were poisoned, and bonuses were paid for those killed. Already a hundred years after the appearance of the British on the mainland, most of the local inhabitants were exterminated, and the survivors were driven into the central regions of the continent, lifeless and deserted.

More recently, new facts have become known. So, even before James Cook, another Briton visited this southern continent - William Dampier. And in 1432, the Chinese navigator Zeng He visited Australia.

Yet none of the modern world powers can be considered the country that opened the green continent to the world. They were the first to visit here, long before the Europeans. They used eucalyptus oil for mummification, a tree that grew only in the northeast of Australia. And on the rocks of this continent you can find ancient images of scarabs - the sacred beetles of Ancient Egypt.

So, the question of who discovered Australia is a very controversial issue that historians are still struggling with.

America was discovered by Columbus, and Australia by Captain Cook. Both of these statements have long been disputed many times, but they continue to live in the consciousness of the masses. Long before Captain Cook set foot on the coast of Australia on April 20, 1770, sailors from the Old World had landed here more than once.

According to a number of historians, the discoverers of Australia are the Portuguese. They claim that an expedition led by Cristovão de Mendonça visited the north-west coast of Australia in 1522. It is unknown whether this happened intentionally or by accident. The details of this voyage are also unknown. The only material evidence that has reached us are small bronze cannons with the image of the Portuguese crown minted on them. They were found in 1916 on the shores of Roebuck Bay (Western Australia) and date back to the beginning of the 16th century.

2 Willem Janszoon Expedition

The first European to visit Australia is considered to be the Dutchman Willem Janszoon. On November 28, 1605, Captain Janszon set off from Bantam on the ship Dufken to unknown lands. Having bypassed the islands of Kai and Aru from the north, he reached the southern coast of New Guinea, completely unfamiliar to the Dutch. Janszohn called it "Marshy Land" and traced the coastline for 400 kilometers. Having then rounded the island of Kolepom, Janszon turned southeast, crossed the central part of the Arafura Sea and unexpectedly saw the shore. This was Australia. In the western part of the Cape York Peninsula, near the mouth of a small river, in May 1606, the Dutch made the first documented landing of Europeans on the Australian continent.

Janszon steered his ship along the flat, deserted coast. Although the unknown land, as the Dutch were convinced, stretched further to the south, on June 6, 1606, at Cape Kerver (“Turn”), the Dufken turned 180º and set off on its way back. During the landing at Albatross Bay, the Dutch first came into contact with the Australian Aborigines. A battle immediately broke out, with several people killed on both sides. Continuing north, the sailors traced and mapped the coast of Cape York Peninsula almost to its northern tip. The total length of the explored coast of Australia, which Janszoon dubbed New Holland, was about 350 kilometers.

3 Expedition of Jan Carstens

The wreck of the English ship Trial, which occurred on May 25, 1622, on the reefs near the islands of Monte Bello and Barrow, showed that the complete lack of exploration of the waters washing the coast of North-Western and Northern Australia poses great dangers. The leadership of the Dutch East India Company decided to explore the ocean south of Java and trace the southern coast of New Guinea. To accomplish this task, the expedition of Jan Carstens set off from Batavia in January 1623 on two ships, the Pera and the Arnhem. For more than a week, Dutch sailors sailed along the southern coast of New Guinea. On the morning of February 16, Carstens saw a high mountain range in the distance - this was the western part of the Maoke Mountains. Five days later, a group of Dutchmen landed on shore to resupply. The local population was very hostile. As a result of the skirmish, 10 sailors were killed, including the captain of the Arnhem.

On March 20, the expedition reached the southwestern tip of New Guinea. The weather worsened and a storm began. On March 28, Carstens sent a navigator on a boat with 12 sailors to explore the shore visible in the distance. They reported that the sea to the east was becoming shallower, and desert land was visible in the distance. Meanwhile, walking along the coast became dangerous: shoals and reefs began to appear more and more often. The Dutch turned to the open sea.

On April 12, land appeared on the horizon again. This was Australia. For two weeks, Carstens' ships sailed south along the western coast of the Cape York Peninsula, landing on land several times - at river mouths and in bays. The natives he met were quite peaceful. The flat and low-lying coast of North-West Australia was described by Carstens in his report as “the most barren on Earth”. The Dutch couldn't even find enough fresh water here. In addition, the expedition's flagship, Pera, was damaged. Carstens instructed Kolster, the captain of the Arnhem, to complete the exploration of the coast, and he himself turned north and safely reached the Moluccas. Kolster, moving south, managed to reach the Gulf of Carpentaria. Taking advantage of the favorable southeast monsoon, he turned northwest from here and, following this course, discovered a large peninsula, later named the Arnhemland Peninsula after his ship.

4 Abel Tasman Expeditions

By the early 1640s. The Dutch knew and mapped the following parts of Australia: in the north - the western coast of the Cape York Peninsula, the Arnhem Land ledge, the entire western coast of the mainland and the western part of its southern coast. However, it was still not clear what this mysterious land was: a separate continent or a giant protrusion of the as yet undiscovered Great Southern Continent? And the pragmatic directors of the East India Company were also worried about another question: what was the potential benefit of these newly discovered lands? What are their commercial prospects? The expedition of the Dutch navigator Abel Tasman, which set out from Batavia in 1642 on two small ships “Heemskerk” and “Zehan”, was supposed to answer these questions. Tasman did not encounter any continent and only on November 24, from the board of the Zehan, they saw a high coast called Van Diemen's Land (now Tasmania). Tasman was never sure whether it was an island or the southern tip of Australia, and Van Diemen's Land was considered a peninsula for more than a century and a half until Bass Strait was passed. Having gone further to the southeast, Tasman discovered New Zealand, and this was the end of the expedition, leaving a lot of unresolved problems.

In 1645, the governor of Batavia, Van Diemen, sent Tasman on a new expedition to the shores of Australia. Tasman's three ships surveyed the southern coast of New Guinea for 750 kilometers and completed the discovery of the Gulf of Carpentaria, bypassing its eastern and, for the first time, southern and western shores. Experienced sailors, the Dutch never noticed the entrance to the Torres Strait. In total, the expedition explored and mapped about 5.5 thousand kilometers of coastline and established that all the lands previously discovered by the Dutch were parts of a single continent - New Holland. However, Tasman did not find anything worthy of attention from the point of view of commerce on this continent, and after 1644 the Dutch completely lost interest in the Green Continent.

5 James Cook Expedition

In 1768, James Cook set off on his first voyage around the world. In April 1770, Cook approached the eastern coast of Australia. On the shore of the bay, in the waters of which the ship Endeavor stopped, the expedition managed to find many previously unknown plant species, so Cook called this bay Botanical. From Botany Bay, Cook headed northwest along the east coast of Australia.

A few kilometers north of Botany Bay, James Cook discovered a wide natural passage into a huge natural harbor - Port Jackson. In his report, the researcher described it as an ideal place for the safe anchorage of many ships. Many years later, the first Australian city, Sydney, was founded here. It took Cook the next four months to climb up to the Gulf of Carpentaria, to an area called New Holland. The navigator compiled a detailed map of the coastline of the future Australia.

Having not quite happily passed the Great Barrier Reef, the Endeavor finally reached the northern tip of Australia. On August 22, 1770, James Cook, on behalf of King George III, solemnly proclaimed the land he had explored as the possession of Great Britain and named it New South Wales.

Physico-geographical position of Australia

Of all the continents on the planet, the most small is the mainland of Australia, which is why it is sometimes called mainland-island. Australia lies entirely in Southern Hemisphere relative to the equator and Eastern Hemisphere relative to the prime meridian. Any point on its surface will only have southern latitude but only east longitude. Runs through the middle of the continent South Tropic, therefore it is located in two lighting belts– the northern part is in the hot zone, and the southern part is located in the temperate zone. The area of ​​the continent is slightly more than $7.6 million sq. km.

Northern tip of Australia - Cape York, located $10$ degrees south of the equator and $142$ degrees away from the prime meridian. Southern tip – Cape South East Point located on the $39$ parallel and $146$ meridian. The westernmost point is Cape Steep Point– $26$ parallel and $113$ meridian and, finally, Cape Byron– the eastern extreme point of Australia is located at the $28$ parallel and $153$ meridian. The coordinates of the extreme points indicate that the continent has short length, both from north to south – $3.5 thousand km, and from west to east – about $4 thousand km.

Washed by water on three sides Indian Ocean, and only the eastern shores are washed Pacific Ocean. The shores of the continent are directly washed by the seas of these oceans - Tasmanovo and Coral sea ​​in the east, Arafura and Timor in the north. The coastline is rugged weak, so the outlines of the mainland are simple. The northern coast is more dissected, where a shallow and widely open bay juts deep into the land. Carpentaria. In the south is Great Australian bay. To the south of the mainland lies a large island Tasmania, separated from Australia Basov Strait. Warm currents pass along the northern and eastern shores. Except Eurasia and Antarctica Australia is located far from all other continents. Towards Europe she is one of the most remote regions world and lies away from the main world trade ways. Within the continent there is only one state - Commonwealth of Australia. The largest city of the country is its capital - the city Canberra.

History of the discovery of the continent

The ancestors of modern Australian aborigines appeared in Australia $42$-$48$ thousand years ago. They managed to move from modern South-East Asia and were engaged in hunting and gathering. They had their own culture and spiritual values ​​based on the worship of the earth. European scientists up until the 18th century believed in the existence of a fourth continent in the Southern Hemisphere, which was supposed to serve counterweight and did not allow the Earth to capsize. The misconception was dispelled when navigators of the late 18th century discovered a huge ocean with many islands, the largest of which would later be named Australia. In January 1504, on behalf of the King of France, he took possession of this island-continent. Bino Polmier de Gonneville. From the port Honfleur on a small caravel" Hope"He headed to India. The ships of all major maritime powers in that era were traveling the same route, but Bino's caravel accidentally deviated from its course due to a severe thunderstorm and on the same day approached the paradise land in the Southern Hemisphere. France could not celebrate the discovery of a new land because Gonneville was unable to pinpoint in which direction he had veered off course. French sailors searched for this land in vain.

A Dutch navigator managed to reach its shores Willem Janszoon. In the 17th century, the Dutch pressed the Spaniards and Portuguese at sea, equipping large expeditions to search for new lands. So Janszon, on behalf of the East India Trading Company, explored the coast New Guinea. In $1606, his ship landed on the shore of an unknown land, and the expedition landed on shore. This was the western part of the peninsula Cape York. Janszon assumed that this was still New Guinea, but, nevertheless, named this land after himself. They were greeted by wetlands and hostile natives. This date is still considered the date of the discovery of the mainland.

Note 1

In the $40s of the $17th century. The Dutch again organized an expedition to find a way to Chile where no one would interfere with them. The expedition was commanded Abel Tasman. He discovered the island Tasmania, New Zealand, the archipelagos of Fiji and Tonga, over the course of many years, explored the coast of Janszon and discovered that it stretches for thousands of kilometers. As a result, he was able to prove that this land was not part of the Southern continent, but a completely independent continent and named it New Holland. The Dutch did not disclose their discoveries, fearing English competition, and the open land was too scarce with a small population. Interest in her was quickly lost.

Australia Exploration

New Holland was surveyed in $1699$. William Dampier- famous English pirate. Observing the life of the Australian Aborigines, he concluded that they are not familiar with metal processing, do not know agriculture and cattle breeding, and in most cases do not differ from Stone Age people. Despite the fact that Dampier's notes were a huge success among his compatriots, the British did not show interest in this distant land for a long time, and only in $1770 was an expedition to the southern seas organized again. The famous English captain went on this expedition James Cook on a small boat" Endeavor». Its goal is to conduct astronomical research. In addition to this there was also secret order- explore the coast of New Holland and declare them an English colony, which was done.

Australia and New Zealand were open to European colonization. The part of the continent explored by Cook was named N.S.W. and was declared a possession of England. By decision of the English government, these lands were to be developed exiled convicts. In January 1788, the first 11 ships arrived on Australian shores, carrying 1030 people - more than half of them prisoners. In the place where they landed and founded a settlement, in the future it became the largest city in the country - Sydney.

Note 2

From Sydney begins an internal study of the mainland, the purpose of which was to search for water, minerals, pastures for livestock, and conditions suitable for the life of settlers. The south-eastern part of Australia was explored Lawson, Evans, Oxley, Hume and others in the first half of the 19th century. As a result of these studies, Australian Alps, Blue Mountains, Mount Liverpool, Flinders, Gawler. The river system was discovered Murray-Darling Lake Torrens, Eyre. The northeastern part and its mountainous region were explored by a German scientist Leichard, which ran along the Great Dividing Range to the Gulf of Carpentaria. In August $1860 $g. expedition R. Burke and V. Wills crossed the continent from south to north. At the same time, a second expedition is going through the center of the continent to the gulf. Van Diemen's, whose leader was D. Stewart. He discovered the central mountain ranges and along his route in $1870$-$1872$. lay a line transcontinental telegraph. Later settlements appeared along it. The desert was open to the west of the telegraph line Gibson, Lake Amadius, Jory Giles Mountains, named after the leader of the expedition, who later passed Great Victoria Desert.

In Sydney in $1883$ it is organized Geographical Society Australia, with branches in Melbourne, Adelaide, Brisbane. Expeditions to study the central parts of the continent are sent under the auspices of this society. The materials collected by the researchers make it possible to lay a large cattle track from south to north through the desert regions of Western Australia. During this period, large deposits are discovered gold, and the territory covers " Golden fever" Exploration of the continent continues throughout the $XX$ century. New mineral deposits are being discovered, and the nature of the continent is being studied. The development of new lands was accompanied by cruel humiliation of the indigenous population, as a result of which the vast majority of Australian aborigines were exterminated. Many explorers of the continent also died or disappeared without a trace, but their work was not lost, but contributed to the rapid economic development of habitable territories.

Australia is the smallest and furthest continent from Eurasia. During the Middle Ages it was called Terra Australis Incognita, which translated meant “unknown southern land.” Who discovered the mainland of Australia, and in what year did this happen?

Official version

Humanity became aware of the new territory thanks to the traveler and navigator James Cook. His goals included studying the passage of Venus through the solar disk. It is assumed that the real reason for Cook's trip was the search for uncharted lands in the southern latitudes of Terra Australis Incognita. He set out on a trip around the world and discovered distant lands, reaching the coast of the mainland in 1770. This date is considered historically accurate. But the existence of a piece of land “at the ends of the earth” was known much earlier. In addition, there were human settlements there. It is difficult to determine the date of their foundation; approximately it happened 40 - 60 thousand years ago. Artifacts found in western Australia on the Swan River date back to that period.

Who discovered the mainland of Australia in prehistoric times?

Scientists suggest that the first travelers to travel to land by ocean were the ancient Egyptians. They brought eucalyptus oil from these regions.

This version is confirmed by cave paintings with insects similar to Egyptian sacred scarabs. In addition, mummies were found in tombs in Egypt, embalming them with oil from eucalyptus trees grown in Australia.

However, all these theories are not officially accepted, since the existence of a continent lost in the sea in Europe became known much later.

Who first discovered Australia?

Attempts to reach the continent were made several times. In the 16th century, the Portuguese set off on the sea route. In 1509 they reached the Moluccas, and in 1522 they found themselves on the northwestern coast. These dates are considered the first time the continent was founded by Europeans.

There is also a hypothesis that Australia was discovered by Admiral Willem Janszoon, who arrived on the continent on behalf of the Dutch authorities. He undertook a campaign in 1605. The ship Dyfken was equipped for this purpose. He followed the direction of New Guinea and after three months of travel reached the Cape York Peninsula. The navigator compiled a detailed map of the coast with a length of 320 km. He did not even suspect that he had discovered a new continent, considering the lands to be the territories of New Guinea. Therefore they were given the name "New Holland".

Abel Tasman sailed after him to the mainland. He explored the islands on the west coast and plotted their outlines on the world map. One of the islands, Tasmania, is named after the discoverer.

Thus, by the 17th century, thanks to the efforts of Dutch travelers, the position of the continent of Australia and its islands on the world map became known.

We present to your attention a chapter from the book “History of Australia” by K.V. Malakhovsky, published in 1980. The original chapter in the book does not contain any illustrations, so to make the reading more imaginative, we have added a few illustrations. (Approx. AussieTeller)

It is paradoxical, but it is a fact that the Australian continent, almost equal in area to the United States of America (without Alaska), was discovered by Europeans later than the small island groups of Oceania. Although ancient cartographers were sure of the existence of the Southern Land, or Terra Australis.

1570 map by Abraham Ortelius showing the Unknown Southern Land - "Terra Australis Nondum Cognita" - as a large continent at the bottom of the map, as well as the Arctic continent

When the Spaniards established themselves in America, they, excited by the Inca legends about the richest land located in the southern part of the Great Ocean, began to send their ships there. The expeditions of A. de Mendaña in 1567 and 1595, P. de Quiros in 1605 discovered new lands, but not the mainland, but small archipelagos: the Solomon and Marquesas Islands, the New Hebrides.

Alvaro Mendaña de Neyra (Spanish: Álvaro de Mendaña de Neyra; 1541 - October 18, 1595) - Spanish navigator. Adelantado.

One of the ships of Quiros, commanded by L. de Torres, on the way back, under the influence of the monsoons, deviated to the southwest and, bypassing the Great Barrier Reef, passed through the strait separating New Guinea from Australia and later named after him.

But the first Europeans to approach the Australian mainland were not the Spaniards or the Portuguese, who dominated during the 15th-16th centuries. on the Pacific Ocean, and the Dutch. This happened at the beginning of the 17th century.
By this time, the Dutch and British had ended the maritime colonial dominance of Portugal and Spain, including in the Pacific Ocean. By the beginning of the 70s of the 16th century. Of all the Asian colonies, Goa, Daman and Diu in India and Macau in China remained in the hands of Portugal. Spanish power in Southeast Asia and Oceania by that time extended only to the Philippines and the islands of Micronesia.

In 1595, the first Dutch expedition to India was organized, consisting of four ships. The Dutch lost half their ships and a third of their crews, but were convinced that it was possible to reach the shores of India. In 1598, a second expedition (seven ships) set off for India. It was a great success: all the ships returned with a rich cargo of spices. In the same year, the Dutch established a foothold on the island of Java and created trading posts there, relying on which they gradually monopolized trade with the countries of South and Southeast Asia, as well as the Far East. In 1601, 40 Dutch ships already set off for India.
Convinced of the profitability of such enterprises, Dutch merchants in March 1602 created a society for trade with India - the Dutch East India Trading Company. The company received such rights and privileges that it became a kind of state within a state. She not only had a monopoly on trade with India, but also had the right to appoint officials to this country, wage war and make peace, mint coins, build cities and fortresses, and form colonies. The company's capital was enormous by the scale of that time. If the British East India Company began its activities in 1600 with a capital of 72 thousand pounds. Art., which equaled 864 thousand guilders, then the capital of the Dutch East India Company amounted to 6.6 million guilders.

Willem Janszoon is officially considered the first European to reach the shores of Australia on the ship "Duyfken"

From the very first steps of its activity, the Dutch East India Company energetically began searching for the Southern Land. One of the company's ships, led by Captain V. Janszon, circled New Guinea from the south and reached the coast of Australia near the peninsula now called Cape York. Sailors who landed on shore in search of water and food were killed by local residents. Janszon hastened to leave these inhospitable shores and in June 1606 returned to Batavia (modern name Jakarta).

The ship's log of the expedition led by V. Janszon has not survived. It is clear that the captain's message about open ground was not encouraging. In the books of the East India Company there is a brief but very expressive entry: “Nothing good can be done there.” Over the next half century, this phrase was repeated more than once by company leaders.

The Gulf of Carpentaria on a Dutch map of 1859 by Otto Petri of Rotterdam

Dutch sailors began to go to their possessions in Southeast Asia in a slightly different way than the Portuguese and Spaniards, whose ships sailed from the Cape of Good Hope along the coast of Africa to the equator, and then to the east. The Dutch chose a shorter route. In 1611, Captain H. Brower, having traveled 4 thousand miles east from the Cape of Good Hope, then turned north, which reduced the time of passage from Holland to Batavia from eighteen months to six.

The Directorate of the East India Company in Amsterdam officially approved this course for its ships. This helped the Dutch discover the Southern Continent and explore its western and northwestern coasts. Feedback from Dutch sailors about the new land was discouraging.

In 1623, a Dutch ship under the command of J. Carstenz, repeating Janszoon's route, entered a large bay on the northern coast of Australia. Carstenz named it the Gulf of Carpentaria, in honor of the then Governor-General of the Netherlands East Indies, P. de Carpenter. In the report on the voyage, the captain wrote: “We did not see a single fruit-bearing tree, nothing that a person could use for himself... The inhabitants are pitiful and poor creatures...”.

In 1636, A. Van Diemen became governor-general of Batavia, who sought to expand Dutch possessions in the South Seas. His determination and perseverance were highly valued and encouraged by the leadership of the Dutch East India Company. On September 16, 1638, the company's board of directors wrote to Van Diemen: "Your Lordship is acting wisely, paying great attention to the discovery of the South Land and gold-bearing islands, which would be very useful to the company." By order of Van Diemen, two ships under the command of Captain A. Tasman left Batavia in August 1642 and set off to explore “the remaining unknown part of the globe.”

Sailing southeast from the island of Mauritius, the expedition reached an unknown island, which was called Van Diemen's Land (the modern name is Tasmania). Continuing his voyage, Tasman approached the shores of New Zealand. He mistook it for the Southern Continent. The next year, Tasman explored the northern part of the Australian mainland, but did not find anything attractive there for the East India Company, especially gold and silver. As a result, the company lost interest in further exploration of the South Seas.

The next European to visit the shores of Australia, or, as they said then, New Holland, was the Englishman W. Dampier.

William Dampier (William Dampier, English William Dampier; 1651 - March 1715) - English navigator and pirate. Considered one of the most famous pirates in history. He contributed to the study of winds and currents, publishing several books on this topic. Member of the British Royal Society. Portrait painted by Thomas Murray

In the second half of the 17th century. in three naval wars (1652-1654; 1665-1667; 1672-1674), England inflicted crushing defeats on Holland, reducing it to the position of a minor European country. Having become a powerful trading and maritime power in the world, England is firmly establishing itself in the Pacific arena.

In January 1688, W. Dampier reached the shores of Australia and stayed there for three months. The following year he was sent to the Southern Continent for the second time. This time Dampier explored the northwestern part of the continent, but a lack of drinking water forced Dampier to interrupt his work and turn the ship towards the island of Timor.

Map of part of New Netherland - northwestern Australia, Sharks Bay, made by William Dampier in 1699

If the Europeans, in essence, knew nothing about Tasman’s voyages, since the Dutch East India Company tried to keep them secret, believing that in the future the Dutch might need the lands they had discovered, then Dampier’s expeditions to the shores of New Holland became widely known, because The English navigator wrote two books: “A New Voyage Around the World” and “A Voyage to New Holland.” Both of them were a great success and were reprinted many times. “The inhabitants of this country,” wrote Dampier in the book “A New Voyage Around the World,” “are the most unfortunate people on earth... they have no houses, clothes... livestock and fruits of the earth... and, outwardly resembling human beings, have little different from animals."

The beginning of British colonization in the South Seas was laid by the voyage of J. Cook.

Strange as it may sound, the planet Venus played a certain role in the discovery of the eastern coasts of Australia and, by the way, New Zealand by the British. The fact is that, according to astronomers’ calculations, on June 3, 1769, Venus was supposed to pass by the solar disk. To better observe the planet, the Royal Society for the Advancement of Natural Sciences of London asked the British government to send a group of astronomers to the South Seas. Having received a refusal, the society turned directly to the king, who approved the plan. J. Cook, who had just returned from Newfoundland, was appointed leader of the expedition. This man was not only an experienced sailor, but also had knowledge of mathematics and astronomy.

The king's decision to send a warship to the Pacific Ocean was not dictated by a desire to please astronomers. This became clear to Cook when, on August 26, 1768, while on board a ship sailing along the Thames to Plymouth, he opened a carefully sealed package from the Admiralty. “There is reason to believe,” the order said, “that a continent or land of enormous size lies south of the path recently traversed by Captain Wallis on His Majesty’s ship the Dolphin, or from the paths of any other, earlier sailors... Therefore, you in execution of his Majesty's will, you are ordered to set sail... immediately after the completion of the observations of Venus, and to be guided by the following instructions: To effect the discovery of the above-mentioned continent, you must proceed southward until you reach the latitude of 40°, and if, having done so, you will not discover it... then you must continue your search to the west, between the latitude previously mentioned and the latitude of 35 °, until you find it or meet the eastern side of the land discovered by Tasman and now called New Zealand."

First (red color), second (green color) And third (blue) Cook's expedition

The Admiralty further ordered: to explore the shores of New Zealand, draw up a map of the islands, study minerals, soil, flora and fauna, collect samples of seeds and fruits, and also declare the land the possession of the British king, having achieved the consent of the local population, and in that case, if it is not there, leave “visible signs and inscriptions as discoverers and owners.”

On April 13, 1769, Cook arrived in Tahiti, and on June 3, astronomical observations of Venus were successfully carried out. Cook then, following orders from the Admiralty, sailed his ship south in search of the Southern Continent.

On October 7, 1769, N. Jung, the ship's surgeon's servant, was the first to see a white cape among the waves of the ocean. The next day the ship entered the bay and anchored near the mouth of a small river, on the banks of which the New Zealand city of Gisborne is now located. The local Maori residents, sensing evil, greeted the newcomers with hostility. In the ensuing battle, several Aborigines were killed. Cook, like Tasman, was convinced of the courage of the Maori, who were not afraid of either the muskets or cannons of the Europeans.

Despite the obvious disapproval of the inhabitants, Cook, scrupulously following the instructions of the Admiralty, strengthened the staff with the English flag at the site of his landing and declared New Zealand the property of the British crown. In March 1770, Cook completed his exploration of the coast of New Zealand. In April, his ship entered Australian waters.
On April 19, 1770, the shores of Australia opened to the eyes of the British. “I named this place Hicks,” J. Cook wrote in his diary, “because Lieutenant Hicks was the first to see this land.” Cook walked north along the coast until he reached a place he called Botany Bay, because the botanists who took part in the expedition discovered there a large number of previously unknown species of plants, birds and animals.

Botany or Botany Bay (English Botany Bay, formerly sometimes Botanist Bay) is a bay of the Tasman Sea off the eastern coast of Australia, 8 km south of the center of Sydney, discovered by James Cook on April 29, 1770. J. Cook gave the name to the bay in honor of his friends - explorers and partners on the first trip around the world on the ship Endeavor. These are botanists Sir Joseph Banks and Daniel Solander, who studied and described many plants unfamiliar to Europeans on the shores of the bay. They also described animals, primarily marsupials.

On April 29, 1760, the sailors landed on shore. Local residents showered them with a hail of stones and spears, and the British responded with volleys of gunfire. “Thus,” the modern Australian historian M. Clark sadly notes, “the European began his tragic communication with the aborigines of the eastern coast.” Until May 6, J. Cook explored the areas of Botany Bay, and then continued his voyage. Coming north of Cape York, he became convinced that the continent he had discovered was separated from New Guinea by a strait. J. Cook declared it the property of the British crown. Having gone ashore on one of the Torres Strait islands, called Possession, Cook hoisted the British flag on it and announced that from now on the power of the British sovereign extended to the entire eastern coast of the mainland from 38° south latitude to Possession Island. At these words, the sailors standing next to him fired three volleys from their guns; The ship responded with cannon fire. The eastern part of Australia, called New South Wales by Cook, became the property of the British Crown.

European navigators, discovering new lands and declaring them the property of their monarchs, did not particularly think about the origin and history of the peoples inhabiting them. They simply stated the fact of the presence of human beings there, who were at the lowest level in their development. Cook looked at the local residents with slightly different eyes. “At first, when I saw the natives of New Holland,” he wrote, “they impressed me as the most pitiful people on earth; but in fact... they are much happier than the Europeans, because they are unfamiliar not only with excesses, but also with the necessary amenities, so common in Europe... They live in peace, which is not disturbed by the inequality of their position. The land and sea “supply them with everything necessary for life. They do not dream of magnificent houses, domestic servants, etc.; they live in a warm and wonderful climate and enjoy healthy air... It seems to me that they believe that they have everything necessary for life."

James Cook declares the eastern third of Australia the property of the British Crown and gives it the name "New South Wales"

Even in the earliest period of European colonization of Australia and Oceania, bourgeois scientists put forward a “theory” about the inferiority of the aborigines, their organic inability for progressive development, which greatly helped in the “development” of occupied lands, often associated with the mass extermination of the indigenous population.
Nowadays, science has data that allows us to assert that the lag in the development of the indigenous people of Australia before the arrival of Europeans is explained by objective socio-historical conditions. “A comprehensive study of the original culture of the aborigines of Australia,” writes Soviet researcher V.R. Kabo, “testifies that in general, despite the preservation of some archaic elements, it has continuously developed over many millennia. And although the Australians ... had the opportunity to experience a deep cultural crisis associated mainly with catastrophic changes in natural conditions, the development of their culture continued, albeit at a slower pace."

Tasmanian (last purebred Tasmanian - William Lunn or "King Billy" - died 3 March 1869)

As shown by archaeological discoveries in Southeast Asia and Australia in the 50-60s of our century, the settlement of Australia began at least 30 thousand years ago, in the Paleolithic era, when the fifth continent was connected with Southeast Asia by continental bridges, the Asian and the Australian continental shelves and the straits between them were not an insurmountable obstacle even for people who had extremely primitive means of navigation.

The natural-geographical conditions that existed at that time favored the development and settlement by people of the Australian continent, including its internal regions, which turned into deserts and semi-deserts only during the period of thermal maximum, i.e. from 7 thousand to 4 thousand years ago. The dramatic change in the environment led to a significant regression of Australian culture. This was facilitated by the profound isolation of Australians from the outside world.

Tasmanian (Last purebred Tasmanian - Truganini - died 8 May 1976)

The arrival of Europeans not only did not contribute to the cultural development of the Australian aborigines, but, on the contrary, was a new and difficult test for them, which can only be compared with a natural disaster of enormous destructive power. Many thousands of Aborigines were killed. The colonialists forced the indigenous people out of the coastal areas into the deserts and thereby doomed them to extinction. If by the arrival of the British the total number of the aboriginal population reached 300 thousand people, then two hundred years later their number does not exceed 150 thousand, including mestizos.