ABSTRACT
James Cook was one of the greatest explorers of all time and one of the select band of adventurers who encountered the extremes of both the Arctic and Antarctic regions. During his second and third voyages Cook went further north and south than any man before him. Cook's second voyage had an enormous impact on the British public. Several accounts of the voyage were published in addition to that of its leader. The Prussian naturalists who accompanied Cook, the father and son, Johann Reinhold and George Forster, both published their own accounts, the latter not authorised to do so. Cook dipped into the Antarctic three times on this voyage, during December 1772 and January 1773. On 17 January, Cook became the first man to cross the Antarctic Circle, approaching to within eighty miles of the Antarctic coast at latitude 67° 15'.
