us hesitate to base so important assumption as that of a discovery of Australia in the sixteenth century on their unsupported testimony". Kenneth McIntyre and development of the theory in the 20th century The development of the theory of Portuguese discovery of Australia owes much to Melbourne lawyer Kenneth McIntyre's 1977 book, The Secret Discovery of Australia; Portuguese ventures 200 years before Cook. McIntyre's book was reprinted in an abridged paperback edition in 1982 and again in 1987 and it was found on school history reading lists by the mid-1980s. According to Dr. Tony Disney, McIntyre's theory influenced a generation of history teachers in Australian schools. A TV documentary was made of the book in the 1980s by Michael Thornhill and McIntyre and the theory featured in many positive newspaper reviews and articles over the next twenty years. Australian history school textbooks also reflect the evolution of acceptance of his theories. The support of Dr. Helen Wallis, Curator of Maps at the British Library during her visits to Australia in the 1980s seemed to add academic weight to McIntyre's theory. In 1987, the Australian Minister for Science, Barry Jones, launching the Second Mahogany Ship Symposium in Warrnambool, said "I read Kenneth McIntyre's important book... as soon as it appeared in 1977. I found its central argument... persuasive, if not conclusive." The appearance of variant but essentially supporting theories in the late 1970s and early 1980s by other writers, including Ian McKiggan and Lawrence Fitzgerald also added credence to the theory of Portuguese discovery of Australia. In 1994, McIntyre expressed pleasure that his theory was gaining acceptance in Australia: "It is gradually seeping through. The important thing is that... it has been on the school syllabus, and therefore students have... read about it. They in due course become teachers and... they will then tell their students and so on". Purported evidence and arguments Interpretation of the Dieppe Maps The central plank of the theory of Portuguese discovery of Australia suggests the continent called Jave la Grande, which uniquely appears on a series of 16th-century French world maps, the Dieppe school of maps, represents Australia. Speaking in 1982, Kenneth McIntyre described the Dieppe maps as "the only evidence of Portuguese discovery of Eastern Australia". He stressed this to point out "that the Mahogany Ship, and the Geelong Keys, and other things of that sort, are not part of the proof that the