Balkanatolia

For around 10 million years until the end of the Eocene, Balkanatolia was an island continent or a series of islands, separate from Asia and also from Western Europe. The Balkanatolian landmass comprises the approximate region of the modern Balkans and Anatolia. Fossil mammals from this area are distinct from the mammalian fauna of either western Europe or Asia.

In southeastern Europe, Eocene finds of Amynodontidae, Hyracodontidae, Brontotheriidae, and Anthracotheriidae have affinities to Asian, but not western European, species. This Asian-related fauna in Balkanatolia remained distinct from the fauna of Western Europe for as much as 10 million years before the Eocene–Oligocene extinction event, the Grande Coupure when Antarctic glaciation began, sea levels fell and land migration to Western Europe became possible; the endemic western European fauna disappeared and was largely replaced by Asian forms. Some of these Asian forms may have arrived in Western Europe from Balkanatolia.