The first information about the existence of an Antarctic Territory could be traced to Aristoteles, who mentioned that on the Earth were only two inhabited areas for the human being. These were situated between the Tropics and the Polar Circles. Man could only use to live temperate places, not near the Equator, nor in the zones of the eternal ice. Ptolomeo's planisphere comprehends lands known between 180° of Longitude and 90° of Latitude; the remains were the "Terra Incognita". According to Ptolomeo the Indian Ocean was a closed sea. But after the Portuguese circumnavigated Africa for the first time, that conception was refuted and the "Terra Austral Incognita" idea was for the first time considered. When Magallanes discovered Tierra del Fuego in 1520, it was thought that they have arrived for the first time to the Austral Continent. The delay of White Continent's discovery could be attributed to the severe climatic conditions and geographical difficulties for the sailors, that they had to confront when they entered into the South Seas during the XVI and XVII centuries. What was called, for a long time on the maps, as Terra Australis, after the Magallanes trip, it was started to be called Terra Magallanica or Tierra del Fuego. Between 1772 and 1775, the English Capitan James Cook circumnavigated the Antarctica, and even though he never sighted it, he was sure that the still unknown continent was nearby, due to the enormous icebergs that floated to nowhere and were coming from that place. At the end of that century, lot of ships from different nationalities, most of them Spanish, was near close to Antarctica discovering different archipelagos of certain importance. The Argentine presence in the Antarctic region can be placed at the beginnings of its birth as a Nation. In September 1815 in one of the several trips made to the Pacific Ocean the Admiral Guillermo Brown, that was on the command of a float formed by the Frigate ARA "Hercules" armed with 20 cannons and the Brigantine ARA "Trinidad", with other 16 cannons, crossed through Austral polar waters, reaching the 65° of Latitude South, in what it's presently the Bellinghaussen Sea, that is 320 km to the South of the Orcadas del Sur and 260 km to the South of the Shetland del Sur Islands. G. Brown says: "After crossing the Cape Horn and experimenting the frequent storms in those seas, and reaching the 65° of South Latitude, the sea became more benign, with a clear and serene horizon, and without ice, that are clues that indicate that we are not far away from land…" (The Antarctic Peninsula). Apparently the exclusivity on the discovery on the Antarctic lands belongs to the rough marines and fragile Argentine vessels, which while they were hunting seals had the privilege to arrive before the English, North Americans and Russians. Unfortunately the nomenclature of the cartography of those regions does not show that fact. On February 1818 the merchant Juan Pedro Aguirre presented a request to the Buenos Aires' Consulate asking for a permit for establishment a sea lion hunting station on some of the southern islands. It was the "Spiritu Santo", one of those many sea lions hunting vessels, which discovered the Antarctica. Argentina offered the required support to foreign scientific missions. Under these circumstances on the period 1897-1899 took place the Belgium Antarctic expedition, commanded by Lte. Adrian de Gerlache. He was on command of the "Belgica"; when he discovered the coast of what he called "Danco", the strait that today has his name, and the Brabante, Amberes and Lieja Islands. Due to the fact that the ice trapped his vessel, he had to winter for a whole year (10 of March 1898 to 14 March 1899) on the proximities of the Pedro I Island, becoming one of the first scientific explorers, among celebrities as the Polish Henry Arctowsky and the Norwegian Roald Amundsen. During the Seventh Congress of Geography, that took place at Berlin (1899), the Antarctic International Commission was created and was approved a recommendation proposing a coordinated plan of investigations and activities to obtain beneficial results from those explorations and studies of the Antarctica. With that purpose, the Antarctic expeditions from Germany, Great Britain, Sweden and France known as the International Antarctic Expedition were organized. In 1901 the Swedish Otto Nordenskjöld prepared in Sweden his Antarctic expedition. This researcher stopped at Buenos Aires with his whaler the "Antarctic". He offered to the Argentinean Navy a place for an officer. The one selected was the Alferez de Navio, Jose Maria Sobral, who would be the first Argentine to winter in the Antarctic. The Nordenskjöld`s ship was trapped by the ice and in 1903 the corbet "Uruguay", under the command of the Lte. of Navy Julian Irizar, became a celebrity arriving to the Antarctica looking for the missing expedition of Nordenskjöld, and rescuing the members of the expedition. Norwegian built the first hut that would allow human beings to spend the extreme winter in the white continent: Carsten Borchgrevink, on service of Great Britain, with his vessel the "Southern Cross". He wintered during 1898/99 at Cape Adare, on the Ross Sea shore, being the first who took with him and used polar dogs. On the 22th. of February of 1904 the Argentine government bought the small meteorological station of Laurie Island to the Scottish Dr. Bruce and founded the Orcadas Naval Detachment. There the first post office in the Antarctic was settled. This is the oldest Argentine permanent occupation in the Antarctic Continent. Between 1911/12 the South Pole was reached for the first time. The success corresponded to Lte Roald Amundsen, the Norwegian scientific of the 1897/99 Gerlache expedition. Amundsen came back this time on the command of the "Fram" (1910/12). He camped at the Whale Bay, in the Roos Sea and wintered at the Antarctic in his way to the South Pole. The First World War opened a parenthesis on the explorations in these austral zones. Since then, the Argentine Navy ships are responsible for the logistic and scientific support to the Orchadas del Sur Station that is the oldest occupation by man on the Antarctic. With the improvements in aviation, between 1928/30, the Almirant Richard Evelyn Bird decided to flight over the Antarctica. With three airplanes named "City of the New York", the "Eleanor Bolling" and the "C.A. Larsen" he penetrated in the Mar de Ross, installed a Base in "Bahia de las Ballenas" (Bay of the Whales) and performed numerous survey flights and shooted aerial pictures. In 1940 the Argentine Antarctic Commission was established. In his behalf the Navy proposed the establishment of bases while intensifying her operations and explorations, research, surveys and the installation of navigation signals. In 1942 the army Lt Eduardo Lanusse performed the first overflight of the Antarctic and obtain extensive photographic records of Deception Island. In 1948 the army airplane Douglas C-54, under the command of the Gregorio Portillo, being piloted by the Captain Gregorio Lloret crossed the South Polar Circle. In 1951 Commander of the Antarctic Navy Group, in charge of the carrier ship "Bahía Buen Suceso", settled the First Continental Argentine Base in Antarctica: the "Almirante Brown Navy Station" under the direction of Lt Antonio Vañek. In 1952, was opened the Navy Station Esperanza, which will be transferred to the Argentine Army few years later. At the end of 1954 the Argentine Navy incorporate the "General San Martín" icebreaker, which would play a fundamental role in the Antarctic survey tasks. In 1979 the "Almirante Irízar" replaced her. This icebreaker and the polar carrier "Bahía Paraíso" are the ones to continue the Antarctic missions. Since the onset of the XIX and during all the XX century intensive Antarctic studies have been performed, recommended by successive International Geographic Congress, with the summit on the International Geophysical Year, where many inquires about Antarctica were answered. At the present Argentina has 7 temporary and 6 permanent AntarcticBases: Belgrano II (1979), Esperanza (1952), Jubany (1953), Marambio (1969), Orcadas (1904), San Martín (1951).