Abel Tasman

From Free net encyclopedia

Image:AbelTasman.jpeg Abel Janszoon Tasman (1603 - October 10, 1659), was a Dutch seafarer and explorer, born in Lutjegast, a village in the province of Groningen, best known for his voyages of 1642 and 1644 in the service of the VOC (Dutch East India Company). His was the first European expedition to reach the islands of Van Diemen's Land (now Tasmania) and New Zealand and the first to sight the Fiji islands, in 1643. He also mapped substantial portions of Australia.

1 First voyage (1642-1643)
2 Second voyage (1644)
3 Tasman's legacy
4 External links

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First voyage (1642-1643)

His task was to investigate the country then known as New Holland, now Australia, of which the Dutch had already seen the west coast, and to determine whether it was part of Terra Australis. It was hoped by the VOC that he would thus locate a new unexploited continent for trade. To do so, on his first voyage (1642 to 1643) he sailed from Jakarta (then known as Batavia) on 14 August, 1642 with two small ships, the Heemskerck and the Zeehaen, first to Mauritius (arriving on 8 October), and from there sailed east at a higher latitude than the Dutch had done before. This way, he completely missed mainland Australia, but did find land at the island of Tasmania, in the Macquarie Harbour area, on November 24. He named it Van Diemen's Land in honor of the Governor-General of the Dutch Indies Antony van Diemen, but later British colonists renamed it after Tasman.

After some investigation, he sailed further east, and nine days later was the first European to see New Zealand, which he named Staten Landt on the theory that it was connected to an island (Staten Island, Argentina) south of the tip of South America. He sailed north along its west coast. At the northern end of the South Island he anchored the ships in a bay, where Māori war canoes attacked one of the Zeehan's boats and four of his sailors were killed in his first encounter with the Māori. It has recently been suggested that a brief landing of some of Tasman's sailors occurred in Golden Bay on 18 December 1642. Tasman named it Murderers' Bay (now known as Golden Bay) and sailed north, but mistook Cook Strait for a bight (naming it Zeehaen's Bight), believing Staten Landt to be a single land, and part of Terra Australis. En route back to Batavia, he came across the Tonga archipelago on January 21, 1643. While passing the Fiji Islands Tasman's ships came close to being wrecked in one of its bay with reefs. Two names that he bestowed on New Zealand landmarks still endure: Cape Maria Van Diemen and Three Kings Islands.

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Second voyage (1644)

With three ships on his second voyage, in 1644, he followed the south coast of New Guinea eastward. He missed the Torres Strait between New Guinea and Australia, and continued his voyage along the Australian coast. He mapped the north coast of Australia making observations on the land and its people.

From the point of view of the VOC, Tasman's explorations were a disappointment: He had neither found a promising area for trade nor a useful new shipping route. For over a century, until the era of James Cook, Tasmania and New Zealand were not visited by Europeans. Australia was visited, but usually only by accident.

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