Swartte Swanne drift op het Eyland Rottenest. – Het Eyland St. Paulo. – Het Eyland Emsterdam.

This is the first printed view of Australia and depicts the VOC ships, Weseltje and De Geelvink, under the command of Willem de Vlamingh at anchor at Rottnest Island, Western Australia, with Black swans

After the expeditions of Abel Tasman (1642 & 1644) there was little Dutch activity relating to the South Land. This lasted until 1694 when the East Indiaman Ridderschap van Holland was lost. It was assumed to have been shipwrecked in the Southland since some maintained that this country lay further to the west than indicated by the charts. Again the VOC had a reason to explore and survey the dangerous coasts of Australia. Willem de Vlamingh, an experienced VOC officer, was appointed to search for signs of the wrecks and possible survivors from the Ridderschap van Holland and the Vergulde Draeck, which was lost in 1656. They were also to find new staging places between the Netherlands and the Cape of Good Hope, and from the Cape to Java. For this reason de Vlamingh’s route included the islands of Tristan da Cunha, Amsterdam and St Paul.

For this expedition the VOC directors decided to build a new fleet, the hooker Nijptangh, the galliot ‘t Weseltje and the frigate Geelvinck. With its shallow draft ‘t Weseltje would prove very useful for exploring close to the coast.

On 29 December 1696 seaman Caspar Broel on board the Geelvinck, first sighted ‘the Fog Island dead ahead’, present-day Rottnest Island. Exploration of the Island, Swan River and the coast to the north followed. Vlamingh landed on Rottnest Island and seeing numerous quokkas and thinking they were large rats named the island” rats nest:” (Rattennest ). Soon after on 10 January 1697, he ventured up the Swan River and named the Swan River (Zwaanenrivier ) after the large numbers of black swans that were seen. The Black Swan was one of the first Australian birds to be recorded by Europeans, the sighting occurred on 5 July 1636 by Dutch sailor Antonie Caen in the ship the Banda on Bernier Island, N.W. Australia. At Shark Bay, de Vlamingh recovered Hartog’s plate and left one of his own for posterity. ‘…various people keep saying that the said land would be more westerly than the charts show…’ ‘…the coast in that region is not yet well known, and is not very clean…’ On Rottnest Island ‘found there the finest wood in the world, from which the whole land was filled with a fine pleasant smell’. ‘God in heaven be thanked for our safe voyage’. Willem de Vlamingh in Günter Schilder, Voyage to the Great South Land …(1985)

From: Francois Valentijn, Oud En Nieuw Oost-Indien (The Old and New East Indies), 1724-1726.