Makassar Voyages to Northern Australia
The makassar are lengendary sea-farers with exceptional navigational skills and courage. They sailed throughout south-eas asia and to northern Australia for many centuries in their traditional praus to the Kimberleys and Arnhem Land to find Chinese delicacies. They made stone drawings of their ships and many of their words went into Aboriginal vocabulary. The Makassar collected trepang(a sea-slug or beche-de-mer) in Australia way before the Europeans set foot on my continent.
The dried trepang was taken to either Makassar or the Phillipines, where they were sold to the Chinese who shipped them to Canton to be used as a gourmet delight in soups. The home base for the prau fleets was the port of Makassar in south-west Sulawesi(former Celebes). The Makassar navigated by reading the cloud and weather patterns, wave periods, the appearance of certain birds and fishes, and the directions and forces of the currents. They were adept at calculating the tides and knew the phases and positions of the moon relative to the seasons. The Makassar navigation methods seem to be very similar to the expert Polynesian navigators of the Pacific. Is there a relationship?
It is quite evident that the Makassar praus had been visiting Australia possibly hundreds of years to get trepang. But when did they first start coming to the north of Australia. The Makassar called Arnhem Land Marege and the Kimberleys were called Kayu Jawa. Is this where the Portuguese got the name of Java la Grande on their Dieppe and other maps? How much information did the Makassar give to the Portuguese about Northern Australia. Did they go as navigators with the first Portuguese explorers of Australia such as Mendonca, Ereida, and other unknown Portuguese mariners? Some historians say the Makassars first came to Australia around 1400. They sailed along the top end of Australia from the Kimberleys to Mornington Island.
The Makassar prau fleets left Sulawesi in December each year, being blown to Australia by the north-west monsoon. They made camps and collected trepang, turtle shell, pearls, and timber. They built smoke houses, boilt down the trepang, and smoked them. In March or April the south-east trade winds blew them back to Makassar where they traded their goods to be shipped onto China.
Makassar Voyages to Australia Resources
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