20 Things No One Will Tell You Before You Move to Australia

The city of Melbourne used to be called Batmania

It was originally named for a farmer named John Batman, who signed a treaty with the elders of the indigenous Wurundjeri tribe to develop the land that later became Melbourne. Batman led an expedition of farmers to the site that he had recently purchased from the Wurundjeri, but was furious to discover that a similar party of farmers, led by a man named John Pascoe Fawkner, had already settled on the spot.

Luckily, their conflict ended when Fawkner and Batman realized that there was plenty of land for everybody. No one was sure what to call the settlement at first, so they experimented with a few names like Batmania, Bearbrass, Bareport, Bareheep, Barehurp, and Bareberp before finally settling on Melbourne.

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