Historical continents

thumb|270x270px|Map of Pangaea around 250 million years ago, at the beginning of the Triassic Pangaea or Pangea ( ) was a supercontinent that existed during the late Paleozoic and early Mesozoic eras. It assembled from the earlier continental units of Gondwana, Euramerica and Siberia during the Carboniferous period approximately 335 million years ago, and began to break apart about 200 million years ago, at the end of the Triassic and beginning of the Jurassic. Pangaea was C-shaped, with the bulk of its mass stretching between Earth's northern and southern polar regions and surrounded by the s

Gondwana ( ; ) was a large landmass, sometimes referred to as a supercontinent. 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.

Laurasia () was the more northern of two large landmasses that formed part of the Pangaea supercontinent from around (Mya), the other being Gondwana. It separated from Gondwana (beginning in the late Triassic period) during the breakup of Pangaea, drifting further north after the split and finally broke apart with the opening of the North Atlantic Ocean 56 Mya. The name is a portmanteau of Laurentia and Eurasia.

thumb|Laurentia basement rocks

ancient continent

thumb|upright=1.35|Baltica (in white, at the centre of the image, with outline of present-day Europe for reference) Baltica is a paleocontinent that formed in the Paleoproterozoic and now constitutes northwestern Eurasia, or Europe north of the Trans-European Suture Zone and west of the Ural Mountains. The thick core of Baltica, the East European Craton, is more than three billion years old and formed part of the Rodinia supercontinent at 1 .

Vaalbara is a hypothetical Archean supercontinent consisting of the Kaapvaal craton (in present-day eastern South Africa) and the Pilbara Craton (in present-day north-western Western Australia). E. S. Cheney derived the name from the last four letters of each craton's name. The two cratons consist of continental crust dating from 3.6 to 2.7 Ga; this timing would make Vaalbara one of Earth's earliest supercontinents.

thumb|upright=1.35|Current extent of Avalonia highlighted in yellow Avalonia was a microcontinent in the Paleozoic era. Crustal fragments of this former microcontinent are terranes in parts of the eastern coast of North America: Atlantic Canada, and parts of the East Coast of the United States. In addition, terranes derived from Avalonia also make up portions of Northwestern Europe, being found in England, Wales and parts of Ireland.

thumb|400px|Sundaland during the [[Last Glacial Maximum]]

former supercontinent

thumb|Map of Sahul with Sundaland|Sunda __NOTOC__ Sahul (), also called Sahul-land, Meganesia, Papualand and Greater Australia, was a paleocontinent that encompassed the modern-day landmasses of mainland Australia, Tasmania, New Guinea, and the Aru Islands.

oceanic plateau in the southern Indian Ocean

thumb|North America during the Campanian Laramidia was an island continent that existed during the Late Cretaceous period (99.6–66 Ma), when the Western Interior Seaway split the continent of North America in two. In the Mesozoic era, Laramidia was an island land mass separated from Appalachia to the east by the Western Interior Seaway. It was home to many dinosaurs including ankylosaurs, ceratopsians, and tyrannosaurs. The seaway eventually shrank, split across the Dakotas, and retreated toward the Gulf of Mexico and the Hudson Bay. The masses joined, forming the continent of North America.

ancient string of microcontinents that rifted from Gondwana

Precambrian craton that with four others makes up the modern continent of Africa

thumb|Atlantica at about 2 Ga. Archean cratons in grey. Atlantica (; Atlantika) is an ancient continent that formed during the Proterozoic about (two billion years ago, Ga) from various 2 Ga cratons located in what are now West Africa and eastern South America. The name, introduced by John Rogers in 1996, was chosen because the parts of the ancient continent are now located on opposite sides of the South Atlantic Ocean.

Arctica or Arctida is a hypothetical ancient continent which formed approximately 2.565 billion years ago in the Neoarchean era. It was made of Archaean cratons, including the Siberian Craton, with its Anabar/Aldan shields in Siberia, and the Slave, Wyoming, Superior, and North Atlantic cratons in North America. Arctica was named by because the Arctic Ocean formed by the separation of the North American and Siberian cratons. Russian geologists writing in English call the continent "Arctida" since it was given that name in 1987, alternatively the Hyperborean craton, in reference to the hyp

Kazakhstania (), the Kazakh terranes, or the Kazakhstan Block, is a geological region in Central Asia which consists of the area roughly centered on Lake Balkhash, north and east of the Aral Sea, south of the Siberian craton and west of the Altai Mountains. The Junggar basin in Xinjiang, China, is also part of Kazakhstania, though sometimes referred to as the Junggar Block. Because the Kazakh terranes merged during the Late Ordovician as part of the Central Asian Orogenic Belt they are also referred to as the Kazakh Orogen. These terranes are located in what is today Kazakhstan, north-eastern

continental crustal block in northeast China, Inner Mongolia, the Yellow Sea, and North Korea

A paleocontinent or palaeocontinent is a distinct area of continental crust that existed as a major landmass in the geological past. There have been many different landmasses throughout Earth's time. They range in sizes since some are just a collection of small microcontinents, and others are large conglomerates of crust. As time progresses, and sea levels rise and fall more crust can be exposed, which makes way for larger landmasses. The continents of the past shaped the evolution of organisms on Earth and contributed to the climate of the globe as well. As landmasses break apart, species are

Mesozoic Era island land mass

Precambrian microcontinent that broke off India and Madagascar

geologic province in South America

craton

islands or continents supposedly existing during prehistory, having since disappeared

continental block in southeastern South America

small tectonic plate now part of the Eurasian plate

ancient craton in the eastern part of South America with outcrops in Minas Gerais and Bahia, Brazil

ancient continent

continent

thumb|Indonesia thumb|left|Gondwana 120Megaannus|Ma ago thumb|left|Plate tectonic reconstruction at 100 Ma ago thumb|Paleogeological context of Myanmar Argoland is the tentative name of a hypothetical paleocontinent which was suggested to rift off from northwestern Australia some 155 Ma ago (Late Jurassic). The evidence for this was drawn from the existence of the Argo Abyssal Plain northwestwards off Australia. An October 2023 article by Advokaat and van Hinsbergen attempted to reconstruct Argoland, where it is suggested that it was an archipelago rather than a solid continent and currently i

thumb|330x330px|Map of the world at the Carboniferous-Permian boundary (~ 300 million years ago) showing Cathaysia (pink) Cathaysia was a microcontinent or a group of terranes that rifted off Gondwana during the Late Paleozoic. They mostly correspond to the modern territory of China, historically referred to in Europe as Cathay, which was split into the North China and South China blocks.

Archean craton which forms the core of the Canadian Shield north of Lake Superior