Australia
Australia is unique as a single nation within an island continent. For tens of thousands of years—indeed, as far back as scientific dating can reliably tell—Aboriginal peoples occupied this land. As hunters and gatherers, they lived in decentralized tribal and family structures with an oral cultural tradition. Knowledge of governance arrangements and community participation of indigenous Australians in this prehistorical epoch is fragmentary. They had elaborate kinship structures and a deeply religious view of their oneness with the land, as well as laws and practices that governed ceremonies, entitlements, marriage, land usage, and sharing natural resources. They used conservation practices in game management but were also interventionist in using fire that promoted the spread of the eucalyptus trees that define Australia's landscape. Apart from rock paintings, ethnographic reports by European observers, and fragmentary cultural practices and stories that have survived, most knowledge of this ancient epoch relies on prehistorical sources.
Modern Australian history dates from European exploration, beginning with sporadic visits by navigators in the seventeenth century. Captain James Cook (1728–1779) claimed British possession of the east coast of Australia in 1770, and the first penal settlement was established by the British at Sydney in 1788. Free settlers were encouraged, and the population grew with the spreading pastoral industries (especially wool growing, which suited a dry continent) and the gold rushes of the 1850s.
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