Terra Australis Magallanica .wmv

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• published: 10 Jul 2010
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Terra Australis Magallanica (Australia) was introduced by Aristotle. His ideas were later expanded by Ptolemy (1st century AD), who believed that the Indian Ocean was enclosed on the south by land, and that the lands of the Northern Hemisphere should be balanced by land in the south. Ptolemy's maps, which became well-known in Europe during the Renaissance, did depict such a continent, they show an Africa which had no southern oceanic boundary (and which therefore might extend all the way to the South Pole), and also raised the possibility that the Indian Ocean was entirely enclosed by land. Christian thinkers did not totally discount the idea that there might be land beyond the southern seas, but from St Augustine's time onwards they denied that they could be inhabited. The impossibility of crossing the ever more torrid space meant that descendants of Adam did travel there, and in addition, since the Gospel was supposed to be made available to all of mankind, and could have been brought therets (although there were counter-myths going back to ancient time about the 'Antipodes', meaning people who lived opposite to us). Explorers of the Age of Discovery, from the late 15th century on, proved that Africa was almost entirely surrounded by sea, and that the Indian Ocean was accessible from both west and east. These discoveries reduced the area where the continent could be found; however, many cartographers held to Aristotle's opinion. Scientists, for example Gerardus Mercator (1569) and Alexander Dalrymple even so late as 1767 argued for its existence, with such arguments as that there should be a large landmass in the south as a counterweight to the known landmasses in the Northern Hemisphere. As new lands were discovered, they were often assumed to be parts of the hypothetical continent. Terra Australis was depicted on the mid-16th-century Dieppe maps, where its coastline appeared just south of the islands of the East Indies; it was often elaborately charted, with a wealth of fictitious detail. There was much interest in Terra Australis among Norman and Breton merchants at that time. In 1566 and 1570, Francisque and André d'Albaigne presented Gaspard de Coligny, Admiral of France, with projects for establishing relations with the Austral lands. Although The Admiral gave favourable consideration to these initiatives. Terra Australis occupies a large part of the southern hemisphere. 1587.Juan Fernandez, sailing from Chile in 1576, claimed he had discovered the Southern Continent. Luis Váez de Torres, a Spanish or Portuguese navigator working for the Spanish Crown, proved the existence of a passage south of New Guinea, now known as Torres Strait. Pedro Fernandes de Queirós, another Portuguese navigator sailing for the Spanish Crown, saw a large island south of New Guinea in 1606, which he named La Australia del Espiritu Santo. He represented this to the King of Spain as the Terra Australis . Isaac and Jacob Le Maire established the Australische Compagnie (Australian Company) in 1615 to trade with Terra Australis, which they called "Australia". British Admiralty Hydrographer Alexander Dalrymple, whilst translating some Spanish documents captured in the Philippines in 1752, found de Torres's testimony. This discovery led Dalrymple to publish the Historical Collection of the Several Voyages and Discoveries in the South Pacific Ocean in 1770-1771 aroused widespread interest and prompted the British government in 1769 to order James Cook in HM Bark Endeavour to seek out the Southern Continent to the South and West of Tahiti.The expedition eventually led in 1770 to the British discovery and charting of the Eastern coastline of Australia. The cartographic depictions of the southern continent in the 16th and early 17th