The First Fleet were eleven British ships which transported a group of settlers to mainland Australia, marking the beginning of the British colonisation of Australia. It consisted of two Royal Navy ve
Engraving of the First Fleet in Botany Bay at voyage's end in 1788
First Fleet, Cape Town, Table Mountain, South Africa, November 1787
Entrance of Port Jackson, 27 January 1788, by William Bradley, an officer on HMS Sirius
The Commonwealth of Australia was proclaimed on 1 January 1901 as a federation of six self-governing former British colonies. The human history of Australia, however, commences with the arrival of the
First Fleet
…The First Fleet were eleven British ships which transported a group of settlers to mainland Australia, marking the beginning of the British (and European) colonisation of Australia. It consisted of two Royal Navy vessels, three storeships and six convict transports under the command of Captain Arthur Phillip. On 13 May 1787, the…
Rock painting at Ubirr in Kakadu National Park. Evidence of Aboriginal art in Australia can be traced back some 30,000 years.
Kolaia man wearing a headdress worn in a fire ceremony, Forrest River, Western Australia. Aboriginal Australian religious practices associated with the Dreaming have been practised for tens of thousands of years.
A Luritja man demonstrating his method of attack with a large curved boomerang under cover of a thin shield (1920)
Abel Tasman, whose expedition of two ships was the first European expedition to discover Van Diemen's Land, now known as Tasmania