If there is a hippopotamus (Taweret) close to the north pole, then there probably is one close to the south pole too, I believe:

"Before the observations of the navigators of the 15th and 16th centuries the singular belief prevailed that the southern heavens contained a constellation near the south pole similar to our Bear or Wain; indeed, it is said to have been represented on an early map or globe. Manilius wrote:

The lower Pole resemblance bears / To this Above, and shines with equal stars; / With Bears averse, round which the Draco twines;

and Al Biruni repeated the Sanskrit legend that at one time in the history of the Creation an attempt was made by Visvamitra to form a southern heavenly home for the body of the dead king, the pious Somadatta; and this work was not abandoned till a southern pole and another Bear had been located in positions corresponding to the northern, this pole passing through the island Lunka, or Vadavamukha (Ceylon).

The Anglo-Saxon Manual made distinct mention of this duplicate constellation 'which we can never see'. Towards our day Eden, describing the 'pole Antartike', said:

Aloysius Cadamustus¹ wryteth in this effecte: We saw also syxe cleare bryght and great starres very lowe above the sea. And consyderynge theyr stations with our coompasse, we found them to stande ryght south, fygured in this maner, ^. ׃ ^{. . .}  . We judged them to bee the cariotte or wayne of the south: But we saw not the principall starre, as we coulde not by good reason, except we shuld first lose the syght of the north pole.

¹ This Alois, or Luigi, di Cada Mosto was a noted Venetian navigator in the service of Portugal, for whom is often claimed the discovery of the Cape Verd Islands in 1456; but these had been seen, at least in part, fifteen years previously, by Antonio and Bartolomeo di Nolli.

And, quoting from Francisco Lopes of 1552:

Abowt the poynt of the Southe or pole Antartike, they sawe a lyttle whyte cloude and foure starres lyke unto a crosse with three other joynynge thereunto, which resemble oure Septentrion, and are judged to bee the signes or tokens of the south exeltree of heaven.

What is referred to here is not known, for, although the figure represented is that of the Southern Cross, this constellation always is upright when on the meridian, and, as the observation was made in latitude 14^o or 15^o, its base star was plainly visible. Still it would seem that some early knowledge of the Cross was the foundation of this idea of a southern Wain."

(Allen)

There clearly is a tendency to expect the same as before when moving to another place, to see 'green' where 'reality' is 'blue'. Nature is fundamentally the same everywhere, that is the experience. If it is not, then it should be. The laws of nature must be universal (turned into one). And the beliefs imbedded in language ('green') are applied to the new environment - land-náma.

There is also an expectancy of balance and harmony. What is above must also be below. I think that the idea of 'mapping' the sky on the ground (Hancock 3) originates from this, that the sky below is a mirror image of the sky above. The rotating ball (earth or sky) must have an axle not just on top but also at the other end.

And Captain Cook had the mission to search for the unknown great land mass that must be somewhere in the south; there was an imbalance, too much ocean in relation to land. Cosmos must have more land in the south.