Misadventures in Nature's Paradise: Australia's Cocos (Keeling) Islands and Christmas Island during the Dutch era - Graeme Henderson

Descriere Misadventures in Nature's Paradise: Australia's Cocos (Keeling) Islands and Christmas Island during the Dutch era - Graeme Henderson

\n \nMisadventures in Nature's Paradise explores the earliest history of Australia's Indian Ocean territories of the Cocos (Keeling) Islands and Christmas Island. \n \nSeafarers from Africa, the Middle East and Asia developed trade routes across the northern Indian Ocean. The first Europeans venturing eastward relied on local pilots, some of whom had travelled southward, collecting natural products from uninhabited islands. These pilots told of terrible dangers, including strong ocean currents, and giant birds of prey. Their stories frightened European sailors wrestling with unfamiliar environments and cultures.\n \nThe Dutch developed shorter trade routes between South Africa and the Indonesian Spice Islands, taking European vessels close to the Christmas and Cocos islands. They produced charts, making voyaging in the southern Indian Ocean safer, but this could not prevent the odd shipwreck disaster. \n \nThe authors, maritime archaeologists Graeme Henderson, Robert de Hoop and Andy Viduka, tease out real-life ramifications of the Indian Ocean and European myths upon the destiny of the Cocos (Keeling) and Christmas islands and provide evidence indicating that several eighteenth-century Dutch ships foundered near these beautiful islands. Their wrecks still await discovery.\n

Detalii

Brand

University Of Western Australia Press

Categorie

ENSTK

EAN / GTIN

9781760802301

Magazine

1

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in stock