Geography Reference
In-Depth Information
age, which lasted from July 1772 to July 1775. Cook was given secret instructions from the
Admiralty to make 'farther discoveries towards the South Pole' (shown at the centre of this
chart) and his findings during this voyage would indeed prove that the fabled great southern
continent, posited for centuries as a counterbalance to the North Pole, did not exist.
The chart employs an unusual projection to represent the southernmost part of the round
Earth clearly on a flat sheet of paper. It gives us the impression of looking at the base of an
upturned globe. Africa sits at the lower edge and New Zealand at the top. The oceans range
around these sketchy landmasses, through which the ship's route is tracked, with dates to dif-
ferentiate passages in the same seas. A more conventional portion of chart is placed at the
top of the page, offering a continuation northward of part of the chart below. The decorative
presentation shows the influence of Classical culture. Supporting the world are two allegoric-
al figures drawn by William Hodges, the expedition's artist. These depict Labour (older and
tired-looking) and Science (an energetic youth wearing dividers as a headpiece).
Captain Cook's voyages of exploration are recorded in the archives among Admiralty cor-
respondence, and within ships' logs kept by himself and by his officers. These documents
contain many charts, including detailed surveys of the specific islands and parts of the coast
where the ships ventured. They provide clear evidence of how Cook laboured steadily in an
endeavour to improve knowledge about the world's oceans. He advanced the cause of sci-
entific chartmaking, with a careful use of running surveys to fix coastlines accurately. His
ship was equipped with one of John Harrison's chronometers on trial, which he praised in his
log: 'We have received very great assistance from this usefull and valuable time piece'. Thus
the voyage played an active part towards a solution for the problem of calculating longitude.
The final lines of Cook's last letter from his last voyage in 1778 - received in London a year
after his death - read 'whatever time we do remain shall be spent in the improvement of Geo-
graphy and Navigation'.
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