90 Australian Geographic
Janszoon explored first to the south, then
turned around at a headland he called Cabo
Keerweer (Cape Keerweer, which translates
from the Dutch to Cape Turnaround). From there,
he retraced his route north, surveying the coastline all the
way to the tip of Cape York. At Port Musgrave, just north of
the Pennefather River, Janszoon and his crew encountered a
group of Aboriginal people while exploring the mouth of the
Wenlock River. This is the first recorded contact between
Europeans and Aboriginal people. A crew member of Duyfken was
fatally speared.
After leaving Cape York, Janszoon sailed north and accurately
charted the islands in the Torres Strait. When he reached an
impenetrable barrier of reef lying off the New Guinea coast
that he called Vuyle Bancken, he headed out to sea and back
to the Spice Islands.
The idea that Janszoon thought Cape York part of New
Guinea is easily refuted. He, or perhaps Rosengeyn, wrote
“Nova Guinea” on the part of their chart showing the Cape
York Peninsula. This has been taken to show that he thought
it part of the island we call New Guinea. But on what we call
New Guinea, he wrote its Portuguese name: Os Papuas. For
Janszoon, an educated and expert navigator, the name Nova
Guinea referred to the land he had been tasked to find: Terra
Australis, the Great South Land or hypothetical
southern continent cartographers assumed lay
south-east of the Spice Islands. It was speculated
that King Solomon’s fabled goldmines were here and
that, like Guinea in Africa, it would be an abundant source
of gold, a “New Guinea”.
Janszoon made a detailed chart of the coastline he surveyed
that is easily reconcilable with modern-day charts. His voyage
marked the beginning of the mapping of Australia by Europeans
and was the first of a long list of deliberate, planned voyages
ordered by the VOC. However, because Janszoon’s account
of Cape York Peninsula didn’t promise commercial gains, his
voyage wasn’t immediately followed up with other exploratory
expeditions to northern Australia. The next series of Dutch
explorations occurred on the coast of Western Australia.T
HE SECOND DUTCH ENCOUNTER with Australia
occurred a decade later, in October 1616, when
Dirk Hartog landed on the island that now bears his
name off the Gascoyne coast of WA. Hartog was a skipper
of considerable experience before he joined the VOC and
set sail for the Indies from the Netherlands in command of
Eendracht with four other ships. At the time, a new route from
the Cape of Good Hope, in South Africa,This is the first recorded
contact between
Europeans and
Aboriginal people.
On 25 October 1616, Dirk Hartog and members of the Eendracht’s
crew (above and left) landed on what is today called Dirk Hartog
Island, off WA. There they nailed an inscribed pewter plate (below)
to a wooden post to mark their presence at the place now known as
Inscription Point. These modern paintings are by Adriaan de Jong,
the artist whose work appeared on Australia Post’s 400th anniversary
commemorative stamps in 2016.Continued page 93 PHOTO CREDITS, CLOCKWISE FROM TOP: ADRIAAN DE JONG; ARTOKOLORO QUINT LOX LIMITED / ALAMY STOCK PHOTO; ADRIAAN DE JONG; OPPOSITE: RIJKSMUSEUM