Who Was First? Here We Go Again...

[GreenGuy]

This article is an interesting look at possible proof that the Portuguese reached Australia before the Dutch. (http://sorendreier.com/kangaroo-drawing-could-rewrite-australias-history/)

I just think that the Euro obsession with who was first - who got where, when, first - is kind of amusing and childish. We have so many people still buying the idea that Columbus discovered America....we even celebrate a holiday. But there's a huge amount of evidence that Columbus wasn't even close to being the first to visit North America. There's evidence that Chinese, Phoenician, Viking, Roman, African and Middle Eastern expeditions reached various points in the Americas long before Columbus was born.

So now the question is, which European nation first discovered Australia? Aside from the question of prestige, what difference could it possibly make? Here we go again... there's evidence that Egyptians were in northern Australia thousands of years ago.

[ghostrider]

The old lyrians posing as egyptians/gods went all over the earth building huge stone cities , a leader and 200 sub-leaders/scientist in special fields of knowledge along with 70,000 lyrians escaped into comsic space in a spaceship they took by force , they settled here on earth about 50,000 years ago ... the earth tribes called them gods but they were from Lyra , the same tree branced out all over eath , all with different agendas over the years ... http://www.futureofmankind.co.uk/Billy_Meier/Contact_Report_9 ... over the years they had many names but , they were from the Lyra/Vega constellations , their insanity is what led to the human race being created ... you can say this one or that one discovered australia but in truth , all lands were under the control of the same barbarian who left his stone cities and his snake carvings everywhere ...

[Atlas]

Mar 21, 2007:
Book says Portuguese discovered Australia (http://uk.reuters.com/article/2007/03/21/uk-australia-map-idUKSYD3449720070321)

http://www.causamerita.com/valard_aust.jpg

A copy of a 16th century maritime map of the east coast of Australia is seen in this handout picture. The copy of the map, taken from a Los Angeles library vault, proves that Portuguese adventurers, not British or Dutch, were the first Europeans to discover Australia, according to a new book which details the secret discovery of Australia. The book "Beyond Capricorn" says the map, which accurately marks geographical sites along Australia's east coast in Portuguese, proves that Portuguese seafarer Christopher de Mendonca lead a fleet of four ships into Botany Bay in 1522 -- almost 250 years before Captain James Cook.

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Australian author Peter Trickett said that when he enlarged the small map he could recognise all the headlands and bays in Botany Bay in Sydney -- the site where Cook claimed Australia for Britain in 1770.

"It was even so accurate that I found I could draw in the modern airport runways, to scale in the right place, without any problem at all," Trickett told Reuters on Wednesday.

Trickett said he stumbled across a copy of the map while browsing through a Canberra book shop eight years ago. He said the shop had a reproduction of the Vallard Atlas, a collection of 15 hand drawn maps completed no later than 1545 in France. The maps represented the known world at the time.

Two of the maps called "Terra Java" had a striking similarity to Australia's east coast except at one point the coastline jutted out at right angles for 1,500 km (932 miles).

"There was something familiar about them but they were not quite right -- that was the puzzle. How did they come to have all these Portuguese place names?," Trickett said.

Trickett believed the cartographers who drew the Vallard maps had wrongly aligned two Portuguese charts they were copying from. It is commonly accepted that the French cartographers used maps and "portolan" charts acquired illegally from Portugal and Portuguese vessels that had been captured, Trickett said.

"The original portolan maps would have been drawn on animal hide parchments, usually sheep or goat skin, of limited size," he explained. "For a coastline the length of eastern Australia, some 3,500 kms, they would have been 3 to 4 charts."

"The Vallard cartographer has put these individual charts together like a jigsaw puzzle. Without clear compass markings its possible to join the southern chart in two different ways. My theory is it had been wrongly joined."

Using a computer Trickett rotated the southern part of the Vallard map 90 degrees to produce a map which accurately depicts Australia's east coast.

"They provided stunning proof that Portuguese ships made these daring voyages of discovery in the early 1520s, just a few years after they had sailed north of Australia to reach the Spice Islands -- the Moluccas. This was a century before the Dutch and 250 years before Captain Cook," he said.

Trickett believes the original charts were made by Mendonca who set sail from the Portuguese base at Malacca with four ships on a secret mission to discover Marco Polo's "Island of Gold" south of Java.

If Trickett is right, Mendonca's map shows he sailed past Fraser Island off Australia's northeast coast, into Botany Bay in Sydney, and south to Kangaroo Island off southern Australia, before returning to Malacca via New Zealand's north island.

Mendonca's discovery was kept secret to prevent other European powers reaching the new land, said Trickett, who believes his theory is supported by discoveries of 16th century Portuguese artefacts on the Australian and New Zealand coasts.

[Kindred]

Why concern oneself with what "euro-centric" group "discovered" ANY region of the Earth??? It's plainly obvious that the ancestors of the Aborigines were 'there First'...

And, besides... All There Are, are Humans... (and a few 'non-locals') LOL

Don't worry about the past.

I say, look to the Future and Manifest the World YOU wish to live on.

In Unity, Peace and Love - For ALL

[Atlas]

---
The First Discovery of Australia and New Guinea (http://gutenberg.net.au/ebooks05/0501051h.html)
Being The Narrative of Portuguese and Spanish Discoveries in the Australasian Regions,
between the Years 1492-1606, with Descriptions of their Old Charts.

By George Collingridge De Tourcey,
First published 1906

http://gutenberg.net.au/ebooks05/0501051h-images/fda-01.jpg

Introduction.

The discovery of a continental island like Australia was not a deed that could be performed in a day. Many years passed away, and many voyages to these shores of ours were undertaken by the leading maritime nations of Europe, before the problematic and mysterious TERRA AUSTRALIS INCOGNITA of the ancients became known, even in a summary way, and its insularity and separation from other lands positively established.

We must not be astonished, therefore, at the strange discrepancies that occur in early charts and narratives, for it took time to realize how different portions of our coast lines, which had been sighted from time to time might be connected, and how the gaps might be filled in by fresh discoveries and approximate surveys.

The question as to who first sighted Australia, and placed on record such discovery, either in the shape of map or narrative, will, in all probability, ever remain a mystery.

However, that such a record was made appears evident when we consider certain early charts, follow carefully the testimony which the evolution of Australian cartography affords, and take cognisance of various descriptive passages to be found in old authors.

These passages will be given here in connection with the old charts, and followed up by the narratives of voyages in search of the "Great South Land."

The numerous maps and illustrations have been carefully selected; they will greatly help the student towards understanding these first pages of the history of Australia.

GEORGE COLLINGRIDGE.

Read full ebook (http://gutenberg.net.au/ebooks05/0501051h.html)

[Amanda]

What an interesting thread. As an Aussie I recall being told about various explorers such as Dirk Hartog and others but it was Captain Cook who took all the credit. The focus on Captain Cook being we became the colonies for the Motherland. Now that I am older and have researched all matters Exopolitical - I can see the links between Captain Cook - the Queen - the cabal/illuminati/whatever. Our history has been manipulated and we have been deluded and deceived for longer than I care to think about.

The Australian Aboriginals are the true Custodians of the land. They lived with Mother Nature and Father Time. Theirs is a history of pure spiritual and ecological balance - they are the Custodians of Australia and that is the history I choose now that I have a choice.

Much Peace - Amanda