
Early Fifth Age
The Great East Continent (Ad."Arazûlzayan","Great east-land" Ol."Aylânlag","wide lands") was the larger of the three parts into which the former Sub-Continent of Southernesse had broken by the third Age. Situated far beyond the known lands of Middle-earth, it became the largest landmass of the distant south and east, a mysterious and largely unexplored expanse that endured into the Fourth Age and beyond, well into the Ages of Men.

End of Fifth Age
It's Inhabitants called it "Girt-by-the-Sea" (Ol."Balûyâgang" or "Mâlyûli", lit. "surrounded by great waters") or "Girtland", although this moniker was also only used for the original númenórean prison colony on the continent's southeastern shores. The other two, smaller, parts of former Southernesse were propably the great central Continent and the great southern Continent or "Southern Ice".
Only some of the coastal regions were explored and settled by men of foreign descend, who had built a small number of settled dwellings in secluded areas.The largest part of the lands were still wild and unexplored, believed to be ruled by the Old Ones, the mysterious indigenous tribes.
Notes[]
Most of the description of the Great east-continent is based on, or heavily inspired by, the Article "Middle-Earth Down Under: An Antipodean Campaign" by Norman Talbot, first published in Other Hands 4. In 1994.
The Article depicts Southernesse as a fictionalized Version of real-world Australia, with many humorous allusions to actual real-world places, persons and events.