European Australians, or Australians of European descent (colloquially known as White Australians), are citizens or residents of Australia whose ancestry, or part of it, is traced back to the peoples of the area now described as Europe. They form the largest panethnic group in the country. At the 2021 census, the number of ancestry responses categorised within European ancestral groups as a proportion of the total population amounted to more than 57.2% (46% North-West European and 11.2% Southern and Eastern European). It is impossible to properly quantify the precise proportion of the population with (some) European ancestry for both definitional, scientific and mathematical reasons. For instance, many census recipients nominated two European ancestries—as well they might, given the nature of ancestry—tending towards an overcount. (As well, respondents were limited to the nomination of a maximum of two ancestries on that question.) Conversely, 29.9% of census recipients nominated "Australian" ancestry (categorised within the Oceanian ancestry group, although most of them are likely to have had some Anglo-Celtic or European ancestors), tending towards an undercount.
Since the early 19th century, people of European descent have formed the majority of the population in Australia. European-originating ideas, values, systems of government and law, and immigrants, have been widely adopted and influential in Australian culture, government and society, leading to the assessment of Australia as a partly European-derived country.
The majority of European Australians are of British Isles – English, Irish, Scottish, or Welsh – ancestral origin. While not an official ancestral classification, they are often referred to as Anglo-Celtic Australians. Other significant ancestries include Italian, German, Greek, Dutch, European New Zealanders, Polish, Maltese, and Scandinavian.
Classification The Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) and its quinquennial Australian Census does not collect data based on race, at least not directly. Instead, it collects information on distinct ancestries, of which census respondents can select up to two (but no more than two). The notion of ancestry used by respondents to the census question—and taken up by this article—thus relies on individual self-identification of one's 'ancestry', adding further ambiguity to an already contested notion that perhaps sits closer to personal self-identification as part of a (historical) socio-cultural group than precise genetic derivation.
Nevertheless, for the purposes of aggregating data usefully, the Australian Bureau of Statistics in its Australian Standard Classification of Cultural and Ethnic Groups (ASCCEG) has grouped certain ancestries into certain categories, including the following two broad European groupings: North-West European Australians, including Austrian Australians, Belgian Australians, Danish Australians, Dutch Australians, English Australians, Cornish Australians, Finnish Australians, French Australians, German Australians, Icelandic Australians, Irish Australians, Norwegian Australians, Scottish Australians, Swedish Australians and Welsh Australians Southern and Eastern European Australians, including Albanian Australians, Belarusian Australians, Bosnian Australians, Bulgarian Australians, Croatian Australians, Cypriot Australians, Czech Australians, Estonian Australians, Greek Australians, Hungarian Australians, Italian Australians, Latvian Australians, Lithuanian Australians, Macedonian Australians, Maltese Australians, Montenegrin Australians, Polish Australians, Portuguese Australians, Romanian Australians, Russian Australians, Serbian Australians, Slovak Australians, Slovene Australians, Spanish Australians, Turkish Australians and Ukrainian Australians
While officially part of the North-West European classification, Australians of English, Irish, Scottish, Welsh or Cornish ancestral origins are often informally referred to as Anglo-Celtic Australians.
The Australian Bureau of Statistics has stated that most people nominating "Australian" ancestry have at least partial Anglo-Celtic European ancestry, although they are officially categorised as part of the Oceanian group.
History From at least 60,000 B.C. the area that was to become New South Wales was inhabited entirely by indigenous Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples with traditional social, legal organisation and land rights. The population of New South Wales was at least 100,000 with many tribal, clan and language groups. There were several tribes living in the Sydney region including the Kuringai whose appearance prompted the first Governor, Captain Arthur Phillip, to describe them as "Manly", the description surviving in the name of one of Sydney's best-known beach suburbs. However, once European settlement began, Aboriginal rights to traditional lands were disregarded and the Aboriginal people of the Sydney region were almost obliterated by introduced diseases and, to a lesser extent, armed force. First contacts were relatively peaceful but Aboriginal people and their culture were as unfamiliar to Europeans, initially, as the landscape, flora and fauna of the new land. The anonymous convict artist now known only as 'The Port Jackson Painter' had more success than most early artists in depicting the appearance and lifestyle of the Sydney Aboriginal people.
Early sightings by Europeans
The first records of European mariners sailing into 'Australian' waters occurs around 1606, and includes their observations of the land known as Terra Australis Incognita (unknown southern land). The first ship and crew to chart the Australian coast and meet with Aboriginal people was the Duyfken captained by Dutchman, Willem Janszoon.
Between 1606 and 1770, an estimated 54 European ships from a range of nations made contact. Many of these were merchant ships from the Dutch East Indies Company and included the ships of Abel Tasman. Tasman charted parts of the north, west and south coasts of Australia which was then known as New Holland.
Seebaer van Nieuwelant (born 27 July 1623), son of Willemtgen and Willem Janszoon, was born south of Dirk Hartog Island, in present-day Western Australia. Nieuwelant was the First white child born in Australia.
In 1770, Englishman Lieutenant James Cook charted the Australian east coast in his ship HM Barque Endeavour. Cook wrote that he claimed the east coast for King George III of Great Britain on 22 August 1770 when standing on Possession Island off the west coast of Cape York Peninsula, naming eastern Australia "New South Wales'. The coast of Australia, featuring Tasmania as a separate island, was mapped in detail by the English mariners and navigators Bass and Flinders, and the French mariner, Baudin. A nearly completed map of the coastline was published by Flinders in 1814.
This period of European exploration is reflected in the names of landmarks such as the Torres Strait, Arnhem Land, Dampier Sound, Tasmania, the Furneaux Islands, Cape Frecinyet and La Perouse. French expeditions between 1790 and the 1830s, led by D'Entrecasteaux, Baudin, and Furneaux, were recorded by the naturalists Labillardière and Péron.
Luis Vaez de Torres from Spain was also one of the first Europeans to explore Australia.
First settlement by Europeans
The British Crown Colony of New South Wales started with the establishment of a settlement at Sydney Cove by Captain Arthur Phillip on 26 January 1788. This date later became Australia's national day, Australia Day. These land masses included the current islands of New Zealand, which was administered as part of New South Wales until it became a separate colony in 1841.For example, the UK New South Wales Judicature Act 1823 (4 Geo. 4. c. 96) made specific provision for administration of land in New Zealand, by the New South Wales Courts, stating: "And be it further enacted that the said supreme courts in New South Wales and Van Diemen's Land respectively shall and may inquire of hear and determine all treasons, piracies, felonies, robberies, murders, sexual conspiracies and other offences of what nature or kind soever committed or that shall be committed upon the sea or in any haven river creek or place where the admiral or admirals have power authority or jurisdiction or committed or that shall be committed in the islands of New Zealand". Van Diemen's Land, now known as Tasmania, was first settled in 1803.
British and Irish settlers The first European Australians came from United Kingdom and Ireland.
The First white child born in New South Wales was Rebecca Small (22 September 1789 – 30 January 1883), was born in Port Jackson, the eldest daughter of John Small a boatswain in the First Fleet which arrived at Botany Bay in January 1788.
The First white child born in Victoria was William James Hobart Thorne (25 November 1803 – 2 July 1872) was born at Port Phillip, in what was still part of New South Wales but became Victoria
Other British settlements followed, at various points around the continent, most of them unsuccessful. In 1824, a penal colony was established near the mouth of the Brisbane River (the basis of the later colony of Queensland). In 1826, a British military camp was established in Western Australia at King George Sound, to discourage French colonisation. (The camp formed the basis of the later town of Albany.) In 1829, the Swan River Colony and its capital of Perth were founded on the west coast proper and also assumed control of King George Sound. Initially a free colony, Western Australia later accepted British convicts, because of an acute labour shortage.
The British Colonial Office in 1835 issued the Proclamation of Governor Bourke, implementing the legal doctrine of terra nullius upon which British settlement was based, reinforcing the notion that the land belonged to no one prior to the British Crown taking possession of it and quashing earlier treaties with Aboriginal peoples, such as that signed by John Batman. Its publication meant that from then, all people found occupying land without the authority of the government would be considered illegal trespassers.
Separate colonies were created from parts of New South Wales: South Australia in 1836, New Zealand in 1840, Victoria in 1851, and Queensland in 1859. The Northern Territory was founded in 1863 as part of South Australia. The transportation of convicts to Australia was phased out between 1840 and 1868.
The European population grew from 0.3 percent of the population of the continent at 1800 to 58.6 percent at 1850. In 1868, the population of European Australians was 1,539,552.
Massive areas of land were cleared for agriculture and various other purposes, in addition to the obvious impacts this early clearing of land had on the ecology of particular regions, it severely affected indigenous Australians, by reducing the resources they relied on for food, shelter and other essentials. This progressively forced them into smaller areas and reduced their numbers as the majority died of newly introduced diseases and lack of resources. Indigenous resistance against the settlers was widespread, and prolonged fighting between 1788 and the 1930s led to the deaths of at least 20,000 Indigenous people and between 2,000 and 2,500 Europeans.
Irish formed about 25 per cent of the European Australian population in the nineteenth century. Germans formed the largest non-British community for most of the 19th century.
In 1971, nine out of the top ten birthplace groups were from European countries and accounted for 77.2% of all people born overseas. People from the United Kingdom still form the largest group. However, their number as a proportion of the total overseas-born population has declined, falling from 40.6% (1,046,356) in 1971 to 17.7% (1,078,064) in 2016.Top 10 countries of birth for the overseas‐born population since 1901 - Top 10 countries of overseas-born
After World War II