Terra Australis Incognita

The Myth

          The idea of Terra Australis Incognita– the great south land – was developed by the ancient Greeks. They theorised that the earth was round and that there surely exists a large southern landmass to balance the weight of the known world of the northern hemisphere. Maps depicted this massive assumed continent which stretched all the way to the South Pole. This idea was met with much controversy in Europe in the Middle Ages, but was revived in the fifteenth century as a new sense of exploration swept through Europe.

          Knowledge of the southern sea increased with increasing expeditions. Bartholomew Diaz and Vasco de Gama showed that Africa extended only to the Cape of Good Hope. Ferdinand Magellan, on his expedition of 1521-1522, by entering the Pacific from the east, showed that South America was not connected to a southern continent. He died in the journey, but one of his ships managed to circumnavigate the world, proving that the world was indeed round. Francis Drake, on his journey of 1577-1580, discovered the Drake Passage (between Tierra de Fuego and the south) and showed that no visible landmass existed south of Cape Horn.

          The myth of Terra Australis persisted in spite of all these and more expeditions are sent in search of it. Australia was discovered, but geographers assumed there must be more. Jean-Baptiste Bouver de Lozier in 1738 and Yves Joseph de Kerguelen-Termarec in 1772 discovered a few subantarctic islands and concluded that their discoveries marked the edge of a southern continent.

James Cook

          James Cook crossed into the Antarctic Circle in his voyage of 1772-76 and encircled Antarctica but found only ice and several subantarctic islands. He concluded that if any landmass existed, he thought that it did, then it lay south of the pack ice and was of no use to the mankind.

          By 1818, several more subantarctic islands had been discovered, but the mystery of the existence of Terra Australis Incognita still remained unsolved.

Timeline

First sightings