"When explorer Christopher Columbus landed in America in 1492, he was 72 years behind a Chinese expeditionary force, which had already made its way to the area.

And although Captain James Cook was credited with discovering Australia for the British Empire in 1770, the Chinese had mapped the island continent 337 years earlier."

British historian and map expert Gavin Menzies will disclose his findings to the prestigious Royal Geographical Society on March 15. Reports here and here

This is not an original idea. Even Australian crackpot Rex Gilroy wrote about it in 1986, he undoubtedly got the idea from elsewhere. His article disappeared from the web shortly after I linked to it, but archive.org still have it cached

"In 338 B.C., Shih Tzu wrote of the presence of apparent kangaroos kept in the Imperial Zoo in Peking, and further similar reports continued in several later dynasties. Emperor Chao about this time dispatched a fleet of junks with orders to return with marsupials from the southern land of "Chui Hiao", and a Chinese book "The Classics of Shan Hai", written some time before 338 B.C., describes Australian Aboriginals and their use of the boomerang.

UPDATE: Review of Gavin Menzies's presentation