The theory of Portuguese discovery of Australia claims that early Portuguese navigators were the first Europeans to sight Australia between 1521 and 1524, well before the arrival of Dutch navigator Willem Janszoon in 1606 on board the who is generally considered to be the first European discoverer. While lacking generally accepted evidence, this theory is based on the following: The Dieppe maps, a group of 16th-century French world maps, depict a large landmass between Indonesia and Antarctica. Labelled as Java la Grande, this landmass carries French, Portuguese, and Gallicized Portuguese placenames, and has been interpreted by some as corresponding to Australia's northwestern and eastern coasts. The proximity of Portuguese colonies in Southeast Asia from , particularly Portuguese Timor which is approximately from the Australian coast. Various antiquities found on Australian coastlines, claimed by some to be relics of early Portuguese voyages to Australia but which are generally regarded as evidence of Makassan visit to Northern Australia. Precedence for earliest non-Aboriginal visits to Australia has also been claimed for China (Admiral Zheng), France, Spain, and even Phoenicia, also all without generally accepted evidence. Historiography Development of the theory in the 19th century Although Scotsman Alexander Dalrymple wrote on this topic in 1786, it was Richard Henry Major, Keeper of Maps at the British Museum, who in 1859 first made significant efforts to prove the Portuguese visited Australia before the Dutch. A group of mid-16th-century French maps, the Dieppe maps, formed his main evidence. However, there is widespread agreement today that his approach to historical research was flawed and his claims often exaggerated. Writing in an academic journal in 1861, Major announced the discovery of a map by Manuel Godinho de Eredia, claiming it proved a Portuguese visit to North Western Australia, possibly dated to 1601. In fact, this map's origins are from 1630. On finally locating and examining Erédia's writings, Major realised the planned voyage to lands south of Sumba in Indonesia had never taken place. Major published a retraction in 1873, but his reputation was destroyed. Major's interpretation was examined critically by the Portuguese historian Joaquim Pedro de Oliveira Martins, who concluded that neither the patalie regiã on the 1521 world map of Antoine de La Sale nor the Jave la Grande on the Dieppe Maps was evidence of Australia having been visited by Portuguese visitors in the first quarter of the sixteenth century, but that this feature had found