Telegraph.co.uk By Nick Squires in Sydney

An archeologist claims to have found a 16th century European coin in a swamp on Australia’s east coast, raising new questions about whether Captain James Cook was beaten to the continent by the Spanish or Portuguese.

The silver coin, which is inscribed with the date 1597, was discovered by a group led by amateur archeologist Greg Jefferys.

A colleague was digging in the sand with a machete when he found the badly corroded coin on Sunday.

It was buried a few inches below the ground in the middle of snake-infested Eighteen Mile Swamp on North Stradbroke Island, Queensland.

If proved to be authentic it will lend weight to the theory that Spanish or Portuguese navigators ‘discovered’ Australia’s eastern seaboard centuries before Capt Cook claimed it for Britain when he landed at Botany Bay in 1770.