The oldest standing house in Australia is generally considered to be Elizabeth Farm, built in 1793 in Rosehill (Parramatta), New South Wales, by John and Elizabeth Macarthur, serving as Australia's oldest surviving European dwelling and a popular house museum. While Old Government House, also in Parramatta (started 1799), is Australia's oldest public building, Elizabeth Farm is the oldest private residence still standing.
The oldest building in Australia: is Elizabeth Farm.
That honour goes to Elizabeth Farm in the suburb of Parramatta. 22km west of Sydney CBD, Elizabeth Farm is best visited on the Parramatta ferry. Built in 1793 (although significantly altered since then), Elizabeth Farm was the home of John Macarthur.
Built in 1793 for the young military couple John and Elizabeth Macarthur and their growing family, Elizabeth Farm today is an 'access all areas' museum. There are no barriers, locked doors or delicate furnishings. Set within a re-created 1830s garden, Australia's oldest homestead is now our most immersive house museum.
Elizabeth Farm (Built 1793)
The oldest surviving European dwelling, Elizabeth Farm, was built before the invention of plywood and during the infancy of the first sewing machine. Elizabeth Farm was the residence of wool pioneer John Macarthur.
The earliest evidence of humans in Australia has been variously estimated, with most scholars, as of 2023, dating it between 50,000 and 65,000 years BP.
The Stolen Generations Reparations Scheme provided ex-gratia payments to Stolen Generations survivors. The reparations aimed to acknowledge historical injustices faced by Stolen Generations survivors. The amount provided to each recipient was $75,000.
Yes, Aboriginal Australians, like most non-African populations, carry Neanderthal DNA, indicating interbreeding occurred after modern humans left Africa but before their ancestors reached Australia, with studies suggesting they have a distinct genetic signature from this early mixing, often alongside Denisovan DNA, showing complex ancient human interactions. All non-African humans carry Neanderthal DNA (around 1-4%), but Aboriginal Australians and Papuans retain a significant amount of this ancestral admixture, possibly due to genetic isolation after their early migration, with some research suggesting they also mix with an unknown archaic human group.
The oldest town in Australia, in terms of European settlement, is generally considered to be George Town, Tasmania, founded in 1803, though older settlements like Sydney (1788) and Parramatta (1788) are older cities, with Bathurst (1815) being the oldest inland settlement, and oldest Aboriginal sites like Madjedbebe (around 65,000 years old) predate all European arrivals by tens of thousands of years.
On January 26, 1788, Captain Arthur Phillip and the First Fleet of British ships arrived at Sydney Cove (Warrane) in Australia, raising the Union Jack to establish the first British penal colony, marking the beginning of formal British colonization and a profound, often traumatic, change for the Aboriginal peoples who lived there. This event, initially celebrated as "Foundation Day," is now recognized as Australia Day, a date viewed with deep pain by many Indigenous Australians as "Invasion Day" or "Survival Day" due to the subsequent dispossession and conflict it initiated.
10 secret Sydney spots you might have all to yourself
The ownership of Australia's most expensive house is often debated due to off-market sales and varying definitions, but currently, a Sydney penthouse at One Sydney Harbour (owned by Yan Zhang for $142m in 2025) and Paul Little's Coonac Estate in Melbourne (sold for around $150m in early 2025) are contenders, while tech billionaire Scott Farquhar owns multiple record-holding Point Piper properties like Uig Lodge.
Australian Visa Age Limits
It is true that most Australian visas have an age limit of 44 meaning that those who have attained the age of 45 years are not eligible to apply for an Australian visa. This article provides alternative options that are available to persons of the age of 45 and above.
Australia holds the oldest continental crust on Earth, researchers have confirmed, hills some 4.4 billion years old. For more than a decade, geoscientists have debated whether the iron-rich Jack Hills of western Australia represent the oldest rocks on Earth.
Jericho, West Bank, Palestine
Jericho is another that is arguably the oldest city in the world at around 11,000 years old. It's located in the Jordan Valley in the occupied West Bank, and archaeological evidence has documented 23 layers of ancient sites and civilizations there dating back to the 10th millennium B.C.E.
Early Australian – old colonial Georgian (1788–1850) Early Victorian (1840–1860) Victorian Gothic (1850–1880) Workers' cottage (1840–1900) Queenslander (1840–1939)
The oldest place on planet Earth is in Venezuela and is called Monte Roraima Monte Roraimo, Venezuela. One of the most beautiful and impressive natural wonders in the world. For more than 500 years, scientists around the world have tried to decipher the unique geological origin of Mount Roraima, southern Venezuela.
The most important is Newgrange. Carbon dating shows it to be one of the oldest man-made constructions on Earth, older than Egypt's ancient pyramids by some 700 years and Stonehenge by 1,000.
Here are our pick of the 10 eeriest Aussie ghost towns to discover and explore:
George Street is the oldest street in Sydney, and the oldest street in modern Australia. It runs from Railway Square to The Rocks, beside Sydney Harbour. Originally called the High Street, Governor Lachlan Macquarie renamed it George Street in 1810 after King George III.
Not only did Canberra top the global list, but it also ranked as the highest Australian city across four of the six core quality-of-life indicators: income per person, income equality, housing expenditure and life expectancy. Discover more about what makes Canberra stand out.
The Australian genome clusters together with Highland Papua New Guinea (PNG) samples and is thus positioned roughly between South and East Asians. Apart from the neighboring Bougainville Papuans, the closest populations to the Aboriginal Australian are the Munda speakers of India and the Aeta from the Philippines (Fig.
The standard three-part test for Aboriginality in Australia requires a person to meet three criteria: descent (biological ancestry), self-identification (identifying as Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander), and community acceptance (being recognized as such by their Indigenous community). This definition, adopted by the Commonwealth government, is used for many government programs and services, although the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) uses a simpler two-part test (descent and self-identification) for general data collection.
Typically, studies have reported finding no significant levels of Neanderthal DNA in Sub-Saharan Africans, but a 2020 study detected 0.3-0.5% in the genomes of five African sample populations, likely the result of Eurasians back-migrating and interbreeding with Africans.