Portuguese Discovered Australia and New Zealand

Christopher de Mendonca discovered Australia circa 1520 for the Portuguese, much before the Dutch and the English pirate Cook.

Category:

Education

Tags:

• Peter Trickett
• Christopher de Mendonca
• Beyond Capricorn
• Portuguese Discoveries
• Portuguese Empire
• Australia

[funseeker08]

Since when did Captain James Cook ""discover" Australia? Dirk Hartog (Holland) left a plaque 144 years earlier and Abel Tasman (who Tasmania is named after) was there in 1642? All Cook did was claim Australia as a colony of England!

[PunchPow]

@funseeker08 and before the Dutch, Portuguese Explorers such as Christopher de Mendonca (1520), Pedro Fernandes de Queirós (1606) and Luís Vaz de Torres (1606) were in Australia long before english Pirate Cook.

[appleblossom1976]

I haven' t got a doubt that the Portuguese discovered Australia, but I doubt the music used at the end is Portuguese. It sounds totally Spanish... It's so sad people keep mixing the two countries up... Portugal is Portugal, Spain is Spain!!!!!! What's so difficult about it? Be thorough the next time you do a report on the Portuguese or Portugal, for knowledge sake!!! ;)

[PunchPow]

@appleblossom1976 I know what you mean appleblossom, the music does sound Spanish like, but i didn't make this video i only posted it. You can thank Anglo stereotyping.

[SpringField911]

at that time Portugal and Castille (Spain) where like U.S and URSS :D

[LadyNatofGlencoe]

@funseeker08 Are you Australian?

If you're not, you might not know that as kids in this country we are told that Captain Cook discovered Australia. I don't know what kids are told today, but that is what we were told in the 80's.

[calica44]

I belive that in 2008 , in Bondi beach , Sydney, some xv century Portuguese coins were found. No discredit to Captain Cook, but the Portuguese were in Australia 200 odd years before the Brits. One has to remember that the population of Portugal was 2 million souls at that time and they were interested in trade, specially spices. Australia didn't have any and the population was aborigenes. No interest at all.

[acf19841]

Portugal "discovered" the world ... or almost ... costs a lot of the great nations now admit that a small country was far more developed than themselves ... and by the way Christopher Columbus was / is Portuguese .. Search for ... do not eat what the media and governments "imposed" as a true

[Valtyful]

@HenrySims - they were the first europeans to reach those territories, but from the trading point of view they were irrelevant.. trade with the aborigines? don't think so..

[Valtyful]

@KaveatEmptor - exactly! portuguese just ignored those territories (Australia and New Zeeland) simply because there was no trade at all of any kind of goods going on there..different from the spice islands (Indonesia) Japan, China,Siam, Malasya.. etc..

[qTions]

Another thing about history, Portugual was the only real global country in the world. In the begining they had colonies but all of them evoluted to Portugal. A citizen that had been born in Mozambique (for instance) was portuguese citizens.

[qTions]

Portuguese made a lot of discoveries in ancient times... But unfortunatly usualy the history is written by those who have the power. When Portugal as a world power nation lost it's power, other countries (principally England) claim from them a lot of things that actually was done and discovery by portuguese.

[HenrySims]

So know, 22 million people in Australia would be speaking portuguese instead of english !