AN AUSTRALIAN map that was sent to Dublin for an exhibition in the 1860s and never returned has finally been repatriated.

Formed from colour prints of engraved copper plates, the map of Victoria dates from the era when the gold-rush state was the country’s richest and most populous colony.

It was sent to the 1865 Dublin International Exhibition of Arts and Manufactures to promote Victoria and was later lost after being stored by the Geological Survey of Ireland (GSI).

Comprehensive surveys stopped in Australia in 1868, the printing plates disappeared and some of this historical information was thought lost.

However, the map was found by chance in the GSI archives. Peadar McArdle, its director, said: “It was rolled up and probably hadn’t been unrolled since the late 19th century. It was moved from building to building until by happenstance someone decided to unroll it earlier this year.”

Petra Coffey, a GSI archivist, took images of the map to the Melbourne Museum when she was on holiday in Australia shortly afterwards. The State Library of Victoria — the custodian of Melbourne’s map collection — and the Australian ambassador to Ireland made formal requests for its repatriation.

The map, which measures 3m by 4m, has now been repatriated by the Melbourne Museum and the State Library of Victoria and is being restored and digitised for an exhibition next year.

Judith Scurfield, of the State Library of Victoria, said: “The map is very valuable, has amazingly detailed topography for the time and fills in some gaps in people’s knowledge.”

The map had several Irish connections. Some of its engravers had worked or trained in Ireland, while one of the authors was Sir Frederick McCoy, a Dubliner who worked at the GSI before emigrating to Australia.

In the 19th century a vast number of photographs, maps and rocks were sent to exhibitions in Paris, Philadelphia, London and Dublin to show off the colony’s progress and advertise Victoria as a place to settle.

Tom Darragh, curator emeritus at the Melbourne Museum, said: “After the initial enthusiasm, I suspect these things have disappeared — sometimes the stuff was sold off, given away or just dumped.

“It is important and exciting to have something that we have never seen before.”

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