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Early Voyages to Terra Australis, Now Called Australia:: A Collection of Documents, and Extracts from Early Manuscript Maps, Illustrative of the History of Discovery on the Coasts of That Vast Island, from the Beginning of the Sixteenth Century to the Time of Captain Cook.Major, Richard Henry

History

Early Voyages to Terra Australis, Now Called Australia:: A Collection of Documents, and Extracts from Early Manuscript Maps, Illustrative of the History of Discovery on the Coasts of That Vast Island, from the Beginning of the Sixteenth Century to the Time of Captain Cook.

Name: Early Voyages to Terra Australis, Now Called Australia:: A Collection of Documents, and Extracts from Early Manuscript Maps, Illustrative of the History of Discovery on the Coasts of That Vast Island, from the Beginning of the Sixteenth Century to the Time of Captain Cook.
Author: Major, Richard Henry

Major, Richard Henry

Australia -- Discovery and exploration; Discoveries in geography -- Portuguese; Voyages and travels

In Dalrymple’s _Hist. Coll. of Voyages in the South Pacific Ocean_, Juan
Fernandez is said to have discovered the southern continent. Burney, who
speaks of his discovery of the southern continent (vol. i, p. 300),
refers to the memorial of Juan Luis Arias for the description. See the
first article in the present collection.

It is needless here to repeat the names and sentences already described
at page xvii as given on early engraved maps from Marco Polo, but it
will be well to notice such peculiarities as distinguish these maps from
those in manuscript, which we have already been speaking of as probably
representing Australia under the name of La Grande Jave. Such notice is
the more interesting as the date of these engraved maps is intermediate
between that of the manuscript documents and the period of the
authenticated discovery of Australia. In the 1587 edition of Ortelius is
a map entitled “Typus Orbis Terrarum,” in which _New Guinea is made an
island_, with the words “Nova Guinea quæ an sit insula aut pars
continentis Australis incertum.” On the Terra Australis, here brought up
far more to the north than elsewhere, and separated from New Guinea only
by a strait, are the words, “Hanc continentem Australem nonnulli
Magellanicam regionem ab ejus inventore nuncupant.” While this sentence
shows how indefinite was the idea of the extent of Australia towards the
south, we think that the entire delineation, which brings the great
Terra Australis so far northward in this longitude into connexion with
New Guinea, goes far to show that Australia had really been discovered.

In various editions of Mercator occur copies of a map entitled, “Orbis
Terræ Compendiosa descriptio quam ex magna universali Gerardi Mercatoris
Rumoldus Mercator fieri curabat aº 1587,” in which similar indications
are given to those in the map of Ortelius just described.

In the map of Peter Plancius, given in the English edition of the
voyages of Linschoten, 1598, similar indications of Australia occur, but
leaving the question of the insular character of New Guinea doubtful.

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Early Voyages to Terra Australis, Now Called Australia:: A Collection of Documents, and Extracts from Early Manuscript Maps, Illustrative of the History of Discovery on the Coasts of That Vast Island, from the Beginning of the Sixteenth Century to the Time of Captain Cook.

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