Beyond Capricorn - Criticism of Trickett's Theories

Criticism of Trickett's Theories

Following its initial reception on-line and in the popular press, a number of criticisms of the book have appeared. The most notable coming from Associate Professor (Spanish and Portuguese) W.A.R. (Bill) Richardson. Trickett repeatedly criticises "orthodox academics" for ignoring or denigrating the theory of Portuguese discovery of Australia, while acknowledging that the book is "not written as an academic treatise - it is aimed at a wider audience".

Trickett’s approach of using only one Dieppe map as the basis for his book, without significant reference to any of the other existing Dieppe maps, has been questioned. The Vallard map of 1547 is not the first of the Dieppe maps and Bill Richardson argues Peter Trickett incorrectly “assumes the unknown Vallard cartographer had access to much more information” because it contains more place names. Richardson adds that "the hybrid inscriptions are in an astonishing jumble of languages", many of which Trickett misreads or misinterprets; suggesting for example that the island Illa do Aljofar may have Polynesian origins.

Trickett also reproduces a number of sketch maps, comparing Terra Java/Jave La Grande of the A3 sized pages of the Vallard atlas with modern detailed knowledge of the Australian coast, but without showing any scale. Richardson argues this practice misleads a reader, and he previously argued Kenneth McIntyre’s comparative sketches also misled in the same way. The issues in providing such sketch maps for comparison purposes are highlighted in Trickett’s sketch map copy of Illa Do Magna, where he compares it to a rough sketch map of New Zealand’s North Island. Richardson adds that the lack of scale used in Beyond Capricorn’s sketch maps causes the reader "to fail to realise that 'Wilsons Promontory' is some 17 degrees, nearly 2,000 kilometres, south of the real Wilsons Promontory."

Commenting in 1985 on other writers who compared Australia’s coast with the Dieppe Maps, Richardson wrote; "it is difficult not to express admiration for the extreme ingenuity exercised in their endeavours to 'correct' the Jave La Grande outline in order to compel it to conform more closely to the known outline of Australia." Writing in 2007 for an Australian mapmaking journal, he suggests Trickett has also taken an approach of “if evidence does not suit a theory, one solution is to alter it.”

In an article in The Globe in 2009, Robert J. King refers to Beyond Capricorn but argues that Jave la Grande is a theoretical construction, an artifact of 16th century cosmography. He points out that the geographers and map makers of the Renaissance struggled to bridge the gap from the world-view inherited from Graeco-Roman antiquity, as set out in Claudius Ptolemy's Geography, and a map of the world that would take account of the new geographical information obtained during the Age of Discoveries. The Dieppe world maps reflected the state of geographical knowledge of their time, both actual and theoretical. Accordingly, Java Major, or Jave la Grande, was shown as a promontory of the undiscovered antarctic continent of Terra Australis. King argues that Jave la Grande on the Dieppe maps represents one of Marco Polo's pair of Javas (Major or Minor), misplaced far to the south of its actual location and attached to a greatly enlarged Terra Australis: it does not represent Australia discovered by unknown Portuguese voyagers.