There were people in Australia long before Europeans 'discovered' the continent in the 1600s. The Aborigines arrived there about 12,000years before from Southeast Asia.
They lived by collecting food and hunting with spears and boomerangs.
They didn't have metal or pottery, but they had very rich forms of art, painting, song, poetry and mythology. There were over 500 different languages and tribes, with complex systems of trade. The lives of the Aborigines stayed almost the same for thousands of years until the Europeans came to live in Australia in 1778.
In 1770, James Cook landed in eastern Australia and declared that it belonged to Britain. At this time, Britain was looking for a place to send its prisoners and criminals. Australia was the perfect place - far away from Britain. In 1778, the British government began sending the first prisoners to Australia. They sent thousands and thousands to different parts of Australia.
Over time, many free people arrived from Britain and Europe. They built small towns and in the 1850s they discovered gold. Life was very difficult. There was very little water and the climate was very hard.
The Europeans suffered a lot in Australia but the Aborigines suffered a lot more. The Europeans stole their land and killed thousands of Aborigines. They also brought new diseases with them. In parts of Australia, not one Aborigine survived. Today, Aborigines continue to live in Australia but their culture is under threat. In 1770, there were about 300,000 Aborigines. Now, there are about 120,000. It is becoming harder and harder for them to continue their traditional way of life.
Today, Australia is a modern, industrial country, independent from Britain. In total, about eighteen million people live there. It is the world's biggest producer of wool and an important producer of wheat, meat, sugar and fruit. The biggest city is Sydney, where about four million people live. The capital, Canberra, is much smaller, with a population of about 285,000.