history of Australia

This article discusses the history of Australia from the arrival of European explorers in the 16th century to the present. For a more detailed discussion of Aboriginal culture, see Australian Aboriginal peoples.

…attended by representatives of Argentina, Australia, Belgium, Britain, Chile, France, Japan, New Zealand, Norway, South Africa, the United States, and the Soviet Union. Later other nations acceded to the treaty.

(Argentina, Australia, Belgium, Chile, France, Japan, New Zealand, Norway, South Africa

Australia, New Zealand, and the United States that was signed in San Francisco, Calif., on Sept. 1, 1951, for the purpose of providing mutual aid in the event of aggression and for settling disputes by peaceful means. It came into force in 1952. The three…

In the late 1800s, as boxing evolved from bare-knuckle fighting to the Queensberry rules, Australia was in the forefront of innovation. A fighter-turned-trainer named Billy Palmer began teaching new defensive techniques to boxers. Peter Jackson of the West Indies, who fought a 61-round draw…

Pakistan, Ceylon, Australia, New Zealand, and Great Britain. The United States, Japan, and a number of Southeast Asian, East Asian, and Pacific countries joined later. The plan came into full operation in 1951. Its name was changed following the end of participation by several newly communist countries…

…was later extended to the Australian colonies, New Zealand, and to the Cape Colony and Natal in southern Africa. These colonies obtained such complete control over their internal affairs that in 1907 they were granted the new status of dominions. In 1910 another dominion, the Union of South Africa, was…

Australia, New Zealand, the Union of South Africa, Eire, and Newfoundland. Although there was no formal definition of dominion status, a pronouncement by the Imperial Conference of 1926 described Great Britain and the dominions as “autonomous communities within the British Empire, equal in status, in…

…men were first transported to Australia, never regarded that country as anything more than a convict settlement.

The interior of Australia also posed a problem: was its heart an inland sea or a desert? This question did not arouse anything approaching the same degree of public interest that was taken in the geography of Africa. Exploration was slow; the early settlers…

…Thereafter, the west coast of Australia was gradually charted: it was identified by some as the coast of the great southern continent shown on Mercator’s map and, by others, as the continent of Loach or Beach mentioned by Marco Polo, interpreted as lying to the south of Malacca (Melaka); Polo,…

…large gold rush began in Australia in 1851, when rich deposits were found in the Ballarat and Bendigo regions of Victoria. These strikes drew diggers to Victoria’s chief town, Melbourne, from all over Australia and England until the early 1860s. While the gold found in North America was usually in…

…in the early history of Australia.

Australia, settled as a penal colony in 1788, initially used the English constabulary and watch-and-ward systems. Problems plagued those systems, however, because both constables and watchmen were often recruited from the ranks of convicts. Modeled after England’s Metropolitan Police Act, the Sydney Police Act…

…New World of America and Australia there was so little existing production of trading goods that the establishment of ties required not only the pioneering of the trading route but also the founding of a colony to create new production. Shipping was critical in each of these relationships but became…

…well as the interior of Australia, Africa, and Asia.

South America, Africa, India, and Australia—had a heavy dependence on river transport.

…the then dominions of Canada, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, Ireland, and Newfoundland.

…removed from their families by Australian state agencies and church missions from the mid-1800s to the 1970s. A national inquiry established by the Australian attorney general in 1995 and conducted by the Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission (HREOC) found that between 1 in 10 and 1 in 3 children…

…Zealand and the states of Australia, had been given substantial powers of self-government since the Durham Report of 1839 and the Canada Union Act of 1840. Yet India, “the brightest jewel in the British crown,” was held not by consent but by conquest. The Indian Mutiny of 1857–58 was suppressed,…

Thailand about 350, Australia more than 500, and New Zealand some three dozen.

…Indies (less Sumatra), the Philippines, Australia, the Bismarck Archipelago, and the Solomons; and Admiral Chester W. Nimitz became commander in chief of the Pacific Ocean Areas, which comprised virtually every area not under MacArthur. Their missions were to hold the U.S.–Australia line of communications, to contain the Japanese within the…