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History
Documento senza titolo
Australian History
Brief Chronology
| Year |
Events |
| 40.000 bC |
Supposed migration of Aboriginal people from Asia |
| 35.000 bC |
Aboriginal people are tought to reach Tasmania |
| 1642 aD |
Tasman reaches an island and calls it Tasmania |
| 1770 |
Captain Cook reaches the east coast of Austrialia |
| 1833 |
First penal settlement in Tasmania |
| 1851 |
Gold rush begins in New South Wales |
| 1853 |
Last convicts are sent to Tasmania |
| 1868 |
Last wave of convicts are sent from Britain to Australia |
| 1876 |
Truganini, the last Tasmanian aboriginal, dies |
| 1901 |
Birth of the Commonwealth of Australia |
| 1911 |
Canberra is founded as the capital city |
| 1914-18 |
Australian troops fight with the British in World War I |
| 1927 |
First Federal Parliament settled in Canberra |
| 1933 |
Parliament rejects a referendum proposed by Western Australia about secession from UK |
| 1939-45 |
Australian troops fight with the British in World War II |
| 1956 |
Olympic Games in Melbourne |
| 1965 |
Australian troops fight in the Vietnam War |
| 1971 |
Neville Bonner is the first Aboriginal member of the Parliament |
| 1973 |
Opening of the Sydeny Opera House |
| 1981 |
Increase in Asian immigration |
| 1988 |
New Parliament House opens in Canberra |
| 2000 |
Olympic Games in Sydney |
Australian history is quite young if it is compared to that of the other continents. The first inhabitants were the Aboriginal people [I1] [Es1] [F1], a race of hunters who are believed to have migrated from Asia about 40,000 years ago. When the Europeans arrived they were no more than 350,000, most of them living in the north and centre of the continent.
European discovery began only in the seventeenth century. The first to sight the unknown land were Dutchmen: among them Abel Tasman [E1] [F1], who gave his name to Tasmania. But it was Captain James Cook of the British Navy who, after travelling along the east coast, landed near Sydney in 1770 [E1] [Es1] [F1] [F2] [I1].
In those days Britain used to send its criminals very far away from home. When they lost their American colonies in 1776, they chose Australia as the ideal place for penal settlements. So in 1788 Britain decided to take possession of the eastern part of the continent and named it New South Wales.
Between 1788 and 1853, when transportation ended, some 160,000 convicts were sent from England to Australia. In 1868 they formed about one ninth of the population. The others were free settlers attracted by the opportunities of large expanses of land for farming and by the discovery of gold in the 1850s. With the gold rush [Es1] [F1] [I1] that made Australia a new El Dorado, there was a population explosion.
As population grew and economy expanded, the colonies began to ask Britain for self-government. Britain agreed because Australia was so far away that governing it was practically impossible.
In 1901, after a lot of discussion, the colonies formed a federation and became the Commonwealth of Australia [Es1] [E1]. In 1911 Canberra was founded as the national capital. Each state on the Union has its own parliament and a governor-general who represents the British monarch.
The Australian Prime Minister is the head of the government, the British monarchy is the head of the state. This is evidence of the fact that the United Kingdom has never lost its influence on its ex-colony.
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