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Concept
Gondwana
Summary
Gondwana (pronɡɒndˈwɑːnə) was a large landmass, sometimes referred to as a supercontinent. It was formed by the accretion of several cratons (a large stable block of the earth's crust), beginning with the East African Orogeny, the collision of India and Madagascar with East Africa, and was completed with the overlapping Brasiliano and Kuunga orogenies, the collision of South America with Africa, and the addition of Australia and Antarctica, respectively. Eventually, Gondwana became the largest piece of continental crust of the Palaeozoic Era, covering an area of about , about one-fifth of the Earth's surface. It fused with Euramerica during the Carboniferous to form Pangea. It began to separate from northern Pangea (Laurasia) during the Triassic, and started to fragment during the Early Jurassic (around 180 million years ago). The final stages of break-up, involving the separation of Antarctica from South America (forming the Drake Passage) and Australia, occurred during the Paleogene (from around (Mya). Gondwana was not considered a supercontinent by the earliest definition, since the landmasses of Baltica, Laurentia, and Siberia were separated from it. To differentiate it from the Indian region of the same name (see ), it is also commonly called Gondwanaland.
The remnants of Gondwana make up around two-thirds of today's continental area, including South America, Africa, Antarctica, Australia, Zealandia, Arabia, and the Indian Subcontinent.
Regions that were part of Gondwana shared floral and zoological elements that persist to the present day.
The continent of Gondwana was named by the Austrian scientist Eduard Suess, after the region in central India of the same name, which is derived from Sanskrit for "forest of the Gonds". The name had been previously used in a geological context, first by H. B. Medlicott in 1872, from which the Gondwana sedimentary sequences (Permian-Triassic) are also described.
Some scientists prefer the term "Gondwanaland" to make a clear distinction between the region and the supercontinent.
Official source
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