Discovering Australia

The Australian Continent may have been discovered by the Portuguese before 1542 and the Arabs even earlier, but no evidence is available to support this theory, and for practical purposes the exploration of the coast may be taken to have begun by the Spaniards and Dutch. In 1606 the Spanish explorer De Torres passed through the strait that now bears his name (this strait is situated on the north side of the Australian continent), but no mention is made in his records of sighting the Australian Continent. In the same year Captain Jansz in the Dutch vessel Duyfken passed along the West Coast of Cape York in the Gulf of Carpentaria. Some of the crew landed were attacked by the Aborigines, and made no attempt to investigate the country. It may therefore be said that Captain Jansz discovered Australia. Extracted from mix sources