Block, SkipCaptcha, Automoderated users, edit
4,575
edits
Changes
Jump to navigation
Jump to search
Created page with "'''New Holland''' was the name given to what is now Australia by the Dutch who discovered the continent in the first decade of the seventeenth century and charted increas..."
'''New Holland''' was the name given to what is now [[Australia]] by the [[Dutch]] who discovered the continent in the first decade of the seventeenth century and charted increasing lengths of the northern, western and southern coasts during the next half century. The discovery and charting of the southern coast of [[Tasmania]] in 1642 settled any arguments that the landmass was part of a super-continent to the south or east.
A Dutch map of the [[Indian Ocean]], made in the 1650s, includes almost all of the coast of Australia from the western entrance to [[Luis Vaez de Torres|Torres]] Strait to [[South Australia]]. And (separately) the southern part of [[Tasmania]] (which was assumed to be attached to the continent.)
[[James Cook]] discovered and charted the east coast in 1770 from about the[[ New South Wales]]/[[Victoria]] border to Torres Strait and claimed this tract for [[Britain]] as “New South Wales” however, west of a rather mandatory line, the rest remained New Holland, at least for a few decades. (The British tended to refer to the continent as “Terra Australis” (South Land) but it was becoming less and less “Terra Australis Incognito”, its ancient sobriquet.)
During 1801/2 the great [[Matthew Flinders]] painstakingly circumnavigated the continental mainland. (He had already delved into Tasmania.) His account, published too many years later, includes the phrase: ''"Had I permitted myself any innovation upon the original term, it would have been to convert it into Australia; as being more agreeable to the ear, and as an assimilation to the names of the other great portions of the earth.”''
Even without Flinders’ comment , New Holland’s days were numbered as the British moved westward. With the settlement of [[Perth, Australia| Perth]] in 1829, New Holland was gone.
[[Category: Australia]]
[[Category: Age of Exploration]]
A Dutch map of the [[Indian Ocean]], made in the 1650s, includes almost all of the coast of Australia from the western entrance to [[Luis Vaez de Torres|Torres]] Strait to [[South Australia]]. And (separately) the southern part of [[Tasmania]] (which was assumed to be attached to the continent.)
[[James Cook]] discovered and charted the east coast in 1770 from about the[[ New South Wales]]/[[Victoria]] border to Torres Strait and claimed this tract for [[Britain]] as “New South Wales” however, west of a rather mandatory line, the rest remained New Holland, at least for a few decades. (The British tended to refer to the continent as “Terra Australis” (South Land) but it was becoming less and less “Terra Australis Incognito”, its ancient sobriquet.)
During 1801/2 the great [[Matthew Flinders]] painstakingly circumnavigated the continental mainland. (He had already delved into Tasmania.) His account, published too many years later, includes the phrase: ''"Had I permitted myself any innovation upon the original term, it would have been to convert it into Australia; as being more agreeable to the ear, and as an assimilation to the names of the other great portions of the earth.”''
Even without Flinders’ comment , New Holland’s days were numbered as the British moved westward. With the settlement of [[Perth, Australia| Perth]] in 1829, New Holland was gone.
[[Category: Australia]]
[[Category: Age of Exploration]]