Recently I'm reading on viking journeys to America centuries before Columbus. And I became curious if anything like that happened with Australia and explorers from Asian countries. From what I can find online, Australia was first discovered by dutch explorers, but it seems weird to me that countries from South East Asia ( if not farther) weren't at least aware of it's existence before its discovery by the Europeans.
I don't know about explorers but the Australian continent and its inhabitants was not unknown to the people of South East Asia. From the early 1700s, the Australian continent was visited by South East Asian trepangers. Trepanger is the term given to fishermen who gathered and harvested trepang, sea cucumber. Makassan trepangers as well as Timorese and other South East Asian fishermen would harvest the marine animals for trade in Southern China where the trepang was highly prized for its culinary value. While we have definitive evidence of trepanger contact in the early 18th century, it is thought that contact may have been made even earlier, perhaps the 16th century as we have rock art featuring boats that resemble those used by trepangers that have been radiocarbon dated to that period.
The trepangers made contact with indigenous Australians inhabiting what would be known later as the Kimberley region as well as Arnhem Land. Both these regions are in northern Australia and while we know trepangins took place of the coast of Western Australia, we can't say for certain if the fishermen travelled as far south as what is now New South Wales or Victoria.
There is evidence that trading took place and that the Australian indigenous people benefitted technologically from their contact with Makassan trepangers as certain canoe and tool designs closely resemble those of Makassan make. Additionally, we can be fairly certain that indeigenous Australians returned to Makassar with the fishermen and that indigenous women were also exchanged in trade. It is thought that smallpox may have been introduced via this contact though the spread of the disease post European arrival makes this hard to determine.
Finally, the Makassan trepangers brought Islam to Australia and this makes Islam the first foreign religion to be experienced by Indigenous Australians. It is arguesd by some anthropolgists that some traces of Islam continue to exist within those indigenous communities in far-northern Australia within spiritual observances such as burial practices.
The view from Marege’: Australian knowledge of Makassar and the impact of the trepang industry across two centuries by Campbell Macknight
Allah and the Spirit of the Dead: The hidden legacy of pre-colonial Indonesian/Aboriginal contact in north-east Arnhem Land by Ian McIntosh