Title: Mainland Australia
Content:   After Australia's Federation in 1901, it was always assumed the Australian capital would lay on the mainland. However, the location of the capital sparked years of negotiating between politicians in New South Wales and Victoria, the two most prominent states at the time as to whether the true capital should be in Sydney or Melbourne respectively. After years of debate to no avail, the two states decided on a compromise that met the requirements of the Australian Constitution. The compromise followed that a separate territory (the Australian Capital Territory) was to be established within New South Wales, however it must be at least 100 mile from Sydney. This territory would contain the official capital of Australia, and until then, Parliament would sit in Melbourne until the city (now Canberra) was built. In 1909, this compromise was agreed upon and was finally legislated in 1911. On the 12th of March 1913, Canberra or Ngunnawal country to the Indigenous people of the area, was officially named as the capital of Australia. In 1915, Jervis Bay territory was added to the Australian Capital Territory to ensure the Commonwealth had a seaport.
Title: Canberra
Content:  Canberra is the capital city of Australia. Founded following the federation of the colonies of Australia as the seat of government for the new nation, it is Australia's largest inland city and the eighth-largest city overall. Unusual among Australian cities, it is an entirely planned city. The city is located at the northern end of the Australian Capital Territory at the northern tip of the Australian Alps, the country's highest mountain range. As of June 2020, Canberra's estimated population was 431,380. The area chosen for the capital had been inhabited by Indigenous Australians for up to 21,000 years, with the principal group being the Ngunnawal 
Title: Australian regional rivalries
Content:  There has been a long-standing rivalry between the cities of Melbourne and Sydney, the two largest cities in Australia. The rivalry between the cities was the reason that neither Melbourne (the largest city at the time) nor Sydney (the oldest and now largest city) was chosen as the capital of Australia when the nation was federated in 1901. Because of this disagreement, section 125 of the Australian Constitution specified that Melbourne would initially serve as the seat of government on a temporary basis, while the permanent capital of the new Commonwealth must be located within New South Wales but at least 100 miles from Sydney. This city became Canberra. Melbourne operated as 
Title: History of Canberra
Content:  The district's transformation from a New South Wales rural area to a built-up national capital began during political debates over Federation in the late 19th century. Due to the Victorian gold rush, Melbourne was Australia's largest city and a potential place for the capital. However Sydney was Australia's oldest city, and so also had a justifiable claim to host the new nation's Federal polity. Western Australia, South Australia and Victoria, Melbourne's state of location —supported Melbourne. However, New South Wales (the largest colony) and its neighbouring northern state, Queensland, favoured Sydney. Perhaps one or another of the two colonial capitals might have 
Title: List of Australian capital cities
Content:  There are eight capital cities in Australia, each of which functions as the seat of government for the states and territories of Australia specified that the seat of the national government, that is, the national capital, would be in its own territory within New South Wales, at least 100 miles from Sydney. The Constitution specified that until this national capital was ready, the Parliament would sit in Melbourne. In 1927, the national capital was finally ready and the national government relocated from its former seat in Melbourne to Canberra within the Australian Capital Territory. Kingston is the capital of Norfolk Island, although this town acts merely as the administrative centre of government. The island territory's de facto capital is Burnt Pine.
Title: History of the Australian Capital Territory
Content:  passed through [Melbourne's] port". Thus Melbourne soon possessed both the size and the economic clout to rival Sydney and to command additional administrative powers. When Federation was first being discussed, views differed about the location of the capital. Early advocate for Australian federation, John Dunmore Lang, backed Sydney, but Henry Parkes, a prominent New South Wales politician and Premier, proposed the capital be founded on "neutral ground", nominating the town of Albury as a location. (Albury was located in New South Wales, yet its position on the Murray River placed it on the border between New South Wales and Victoria). In 
Title: History of Sydney
Content:   The History of Sydney begins in prehistoric times with the occupation of the district by Australian Aboriginals, whose ancestors came to Sydney in the Upper Paleolithic period. The modern history of the city began with the arrival of a First Fleet of British ships in 1788 and the foundation of a penal colony by Great Britain. From 1788 to 1900 Sydney was the capital of the British colony of New South Wales. An elected city council was established in 1840. In 1901, Sydney became a state capital, when New South Wales voted to join the Australian Federation. Sydney today is Australia's largest city and a major international capital of culture and finance. The city has played host to many international events, including the 2000 Summer Olympics.
Title: History of Melbourne
Content:  Melbourne's status as Australia's largest city lasted long enough, however, for it to become the seat of government of the new Commonwealth of Australia when the six colonies federated in 1901. Parliament House in Spring St was lent to the Parliament of Australia, while Victoria's Parliament found temporary accommodation in the Royal Exhibition Building. The city's growth stalled, and by 1905 Sydney had resumed its place as Australia's largest city. Economic growth slowly resumed from 1900, and Melbourne's population reached 670,000 by 1914. But the boom years did not return, and the level of wages remained far lower than it had been in the 1880s. As a result, urban poverty became a feature of city life, and the slum areas of the inner suburbs spread. Due to long delays in establishing a permanent capital at Canberra, Melbourne remained Australia's capital until 1927, when the parliament finally moved to the 'country capital'. Melbourne nevertheless remained the centre of the Commonwealth Public Service, the Australian Defence Forces, and as the location of the High Court of Australia for some time afterwards.
Title: Melbourne
Content:  Land (modern-day Tasmania), that Melbourne was founded. It was incorporated as a Crown settlement in 1837, and named after the then British Prime Minister, William Lamb, 2nd Viscount Melbourne. In 1851, four years after Queen Victoria declared it a city, Melbourne became the capital of the new colony of Victoria. During the 1850s Victorian gold rush, the city entered a lengthy boom period that, by the late 1880s, had transformed it into one of the world's largest and wealthiest metropolises. After the federation of Australia in 1901, it served as the interim seat of government of the new nation until 
Title: Australia
Content:  Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands. It is the largest country by area in Oceania and the world's sixth-largest country. Australia's population of nearly million, in an area of 7617930 km2, is highly urbanised and heavily concentrated on the eastern seaboard. Canberra is the nation's capital, while the largest city is Sydney, and other major metropolitan areas include Melbourne, Brisbane, Perth, and Adelaide. Indigenous Australians inhabited the continent beginning about 65,000 years ago, prior to the first arrival of Dutch explorers in 

Question: what was the first capital city of australia?
Answer: New South Wales.
Melbourne.
Sydney.