Initially forged more than 85 million years ago when the two continents were joined together as part of Gondwana Land, Australia's connection to Antarctica has endured ever since.
Joy McCann's fascinating book is a comprehensive guide to Australia's history on and around the frozen continent.
Sir Douglas Mawson, Sir Hubert Wilkins, Frank Hurley, Thomas Griffith-Taylor, Frank Wild, John King Davis, Carsten Borchgrevink and Louis Bernacchi - the book takes a look at the brave and adventurous souls who ventured south to improve our knowledge of the vast, inhospitable, ice blanketed continent.
Ice Bound takes a comprehensive look at the human race's fascination with the continent, a fascination which was born long before it had even been discovered.
It explores how Greek philosopher Claudius Ptolemy's suggestion in the second century CE that a vast expanse of ice must exist in the south sparked a thirst for knowledge about what might be found in the region.
It recounts the first crossing of the Antarctic Circle by Captain Cook in 1773, and how Cook's 1777 report detailing the Circle's abundance of whales and fur seals sparked Australia's fascination with the mysterious south.
The author explains how Australian colonists established a number of processing stations along its southern coastlines and islands in the early to mid 1800s to capitalise on the areas hunting potential, and how this sparked a national fascination with the region which endures to this day.
Following the first confirmed sighting of mainland Antarctica by a Russian expedition led by Fabian Gottlieb von Bellingshausen and Mikhail Lazarev, this fascination continued to grow.
The book details Sir Douglas Mawson's pioneering visits to the continent with the goal of establishing three scientific stations, an expedition which would ultimately demonstrate his young country's worth to the global community.
From the establishment of these stations, to the brave Australians who charted new territory, pushing into the continent's perilous inland ice sheets, the book gives a comprehensive overview of how a continent that had been sought for almost 2000 years helped to put Australia on the map.
Ice Bound: The Australian Story of Antarctica, by Joy McCann (NLA Publishing) RRP $49.99