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Dictionary of Sydney

The Dictionary of Sydney
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First Government House, Sydney c1807

The Dictionary of Sydney was archived in 2021.

First Government House, Sydney c1807

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From the collections of the

State Library of New South Wales

[a128359 / SV/31]

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First Government House Museum of Sydney The first Government House: building on Phillip’s ‘good foundation’ Woollarawarre Bennelong

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Colonial architecture Public building Residential building State government

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First Government House

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Eyre, John

State Library of New South Wales

First Government House

A two-storey brick house, Government House was the most impressive building in the early colony. It was not well-built however, and required frequent repairs. Plans to replace it were first suggested in 1817, but the new Government House was not completed until 1845.

Museum of Sydney

Built on the site of Sydney's first Government House, where the British colonisers first met the Gadigal people, the Museum of Sydney tells the story of the city's development.

Woollarawarre Bennelong

Thrust into history by his abduction, Bennelong led a tumultuous life, becoming the best known Aboriginal figure in the first decades of European settlement. His story, plagued by myths, connects twenty-first century Australia with the social and spiritual Aboriginal world that existed before the English colony of New South Wales.

The first Government House: building on Phillip’s ‘good foundation’

The first Government House was not a simple singular structure but a complex with a yard, outbuildings, guardhouse, garden and greater domain. It was a home, an office and a venue for public and private entertaining, but also a symbol of British authority, with all that that meant to different people, both then and now.

Colonial architecture

Public building

Residential building

State government

First Government House

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Residence for the first nine Governors of NSW, which was the first major building in the colony. The first permanent building in the colony, it had two storeys built of bricks and stone comprising six rooms, two cellars and a rear staircase. In front of the house was a garden where many imported plant species were grown and the first orchard planted. The Museum of Sydney, on the corner of Bridge and Phillip Streets, was built on its site.