Anyone who has ever studied a globe has probably noticed that the distribution of land on our planet

is highly unbalanced between the northern and southern hemispheres. In ancient times,

Greco-Roman thinkers hypothesized that the land masses of the earth must be balanced, and therefore there must be a large

unknown land mass in the southern hemisphere, which came to be referred to as Terra Australis,

the southern land. European explorers spent centuries searching for this hypothetical land at last all but giving up on its

existence. But it was out there. It was just very, very hard to reach. Welcome to the history

of the 20th century.

Music the history of the 20th century. Episode 61, Tara Australis.

When Ferdin and Magellan made his voyage to the Philippines, as I described all the way back in episode three.

He sailed around South America through the strait we now call the Strait of Magellan.

It was widely believed that the land to the south of that strait was also part of Terra Australis.

When the Spanish and Portuguese reached New Guinea, this large land mass was suspected

of being part of Terra Australis. When Dutch explorers discovered New Holland and New Zealand,

these lands were also at first suspected to be part of a vast southern continent.

But as the age of exploration progressed,

and more and more of the southern hemisphere proved to be ocean,

the potential size of this hypothetical continent kept getting smaller.

In 1615, a Dutch explorer named Willem Schulton, rounded Cape Horn,

and found that Tierra del Fuego was a relatively small island with a vast ocean to itself.

In 1642, another Dutch explorer, Abel Tasman, circumnavigated New Holland and determined that there was an ocean to its south.

In 1770, the British explorer James Cook explored New Zealand and showed that it was not part of a larger landmass.

From 1772 to 1775, Cook commanded a second expedition to the far south, and in the course of

...