Gondwana

Gondwana, also called Gondwanaland, was a southern supercontinent that existed from the late Precambrian to the Jurassic. It formed through the collision and merging of several ancient landmasses and began to fragment during the Jurassic period, with its fragments eventually giving rise to most of the landmasses now found in the southern hemisphere.

Its core included Africa, South America, Antarctica, India, Australia, Madagascar, and portions of what is now the Arabian Peninsula, with the Indian subcontinent forming a later, significant appendage before it collided with Asia. The configuration of these landmasses varied over time as they rifted and moved.

Evidence for Gondwana comes from multiple lines of inquiry. The distribution of fossils such as the glossopterid plants across southern continents, and reptile fossils like Mesosaurus and Lystrosaurus found in Africa, India, South America, and Antarctica, support a shared past. Correlated rock sequences, palaeoclimatic indicators, and glacial deposits across these regions further reinforce the concept of a connected southern landmass.

The break-up began in the Jurassic, leading to the opening of oceans that separated Africa, South America, India, Australia, Antarctica, and Madagascar. Over tens of millions of years, these landmasses drifted toward their present positions, with India later colliding with Asia to form the Himalayas and with the Atlantic Ocean expanding to separate Africa from South America. Gondwana’s remnants are integral to understanding modern continental geography and the distribution of ancient flora and fauna.

In scholarly use, Gondwana remains a foundational concept in plate tectonics and paleobiogeography, helping explain patterns of similarity among southern Hemisphere continents.