AD 1521

Portuguese navigator Ferdinand Magellan sees the atoll of Pukapuka, Tahiti

AD 1525

Spanish mapmaker Diego Ribeiro makes first scientific charts covering the Pacific

AD 1525

Portuguese probably visit Caroline Islands, northeast of New Guinea, and nearby Palau Islands

AD 1526

Portuguese land on Papua New Guinea

AD 1526

Gomez de Sequeira visits the Caroline Islands

AD 1528

Spanish Alvaro de Saavedra discovers Admiralty Islands

AD 1528

Alvaro de Saavedera lands on Ulithi, Caroline Islands

AD 1550

Around this time Maoris of New Zealand build fortified enclosures

AD 1565

Legazpi claims Guam for Spain

AD 1567

Spanish Alvaro de Mendana reaches the Ellice Islands and Solomon Islands

AD 1595

Spanish navigator Alvaro de Mendana visits Marquesas Islands and then Nderic (Santa Cruz)

AD 1595

Pedro Fernandes des Quiros lands at Ponape, Caroline Islands

AD 1596

Alvaro de Mendana is the first European to sight the Cook Islands

AD 1600

Tupa, stone towers with inner chambers, built on Easter Island

AD 1600

Tu'i Konokupolu dynasty take power in Tonga

AD 1606

Portuguese explorer Luis Váez de Torres discovers the existence of Australia

AD 1606

Portuguese explorer Luis Vaez de Torres sails around New Guinea and reaches the straits now named after him

AD 1606

Pedro Fernández de Quirós discovers the New Hebrides

AD 1616

Dutch captain, Dirck Hartog is first European to record a landing on west Australian coast; leaves an engraved plate as a monument

AD 1616

Dutch explorers are the first Europeans to visit Tonga

AD 1616

Dutch navigator William Schouten visits Manus, Admiralty Islands

AD 1622

English ship Trial wrecked off the coast of Western Australia

AD 1623

Jan Carstenszoon visits northern Australia and names Bay of Carpentie

AD 1627

Nuytsland discovered, Western Australia

AD 1629

Dutch East India Company ship Batavia, with 316 people on board, is wrecked off Western Australia

AD 1642

Dutch explorer Abel Tasman discovers Van Diemen's Land (Tasmania)

AD 1642

Dutch explorer Abel Tasman visits New Zealand

AD 1643

Dutch explorer Abel Tasman is the first European to visit Fiji

AD 1644

Tasman maps the north and west coasts of Australia

AD 1644

Abel Tasman explores the Gulf of Carpentaria

AD 1668

First missionaries arrive, at Guam, Marianas Islands

AD 1680

Statue building ends on Easter Island; resources and population decline

AD 1688

English explorer William Dampier lands on Australia's north-west coast

AD 1696

Dutch explorer Willem de Vlamingh charts south-western coast Australia

AD 1697

Dutch explorer Willem De Vlamingh, replaced Hartog's plate with one of his own

AD 1699

English adventurer William Dampier names Shark's Bay, Western Australia

AD 1700

Tahitians and Europeans meet for the first time, on Moorea Island

AD 1710

By this time all Guam has been converted to Christianity

AD 1722

Dutch navigator Jacob Roggeveen is the first European to explore Samoa

AD 1767

British Captain Samuel Wallis is the first European to reach Tahiti

AD 1767

Wallis annexes Tahiti for Britain

AD 1767

Philip Carteret names the Admiralty Islands

AD 1768

Bouganville annexes Tahiti for France

AD 1769

Captain James Cook in the Endeavour sails up the east coast of Australia

AD 1769

British navigator James Cook anchors in Matavai Bay, Tahiti, to observe the transit of Venus

AD 1769

Cook takes formal possession of New Zealand for Britain

AD 1770

Spanish sailors reach Easter Island

AD 1770

South Cape, New Zealand, first sighted by James Cook

AD 1770

Cook completes circumnavigation of South Island, New Zealand