Paleomaps are
mapA map is a visual representation of an area—a symbolic depiction highlighting relationships between elements of that space such as objects, regions, and themes....
s of continents and mountain ranges in the distant past or future. Until the 1960s, paleomaps were not very satisfactory as it was difficult to understand many quite distinctive features. For example huge
river deltaA delta is a landform that is created at the mouth of a river where that river flows into an ocean, sea, estuary, lake, reservoir, flat arid area, or another river. Deltas are formed from the deposition of the sediment carried by the river as the flow leaves the mouth of the river...
s seemed to be associated with what must have been quite small drainage basins. With the discovery of
plate tectonicsPlate tectonics is a theory which describes the large scale motions of Earth's lithosphere...
, it became apparent that land masses move relative to one another over time.
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Paleomaps are
mapA map is a visual representation of an area—a symbolic depiction highlighting relationships between elements of that space such as objects, regions, and themes....
s of continents and mountain ranges in the distant past or future. Until the 1960s, paleomaps were not very satisfactory as it was difficult to understand many quite distinctive features. For example huge
river deltaA delta is a landform that is created at the mouth of a river where that river flows into an ocean, sea, estuary, lake, reservoir, flat arid area, or another river. Deltas are formed from the deposition of the sediment carried by the river as the flow leaves the mouth of the river...
s seemed to be associated with what must have been quite small drainage basins. With the discovery of
plate tectonicsPlate tectonics is a theory which describes the large scale motions of Earth's lithosphere...
, it became apparent that land masses move relative to one another over time. Ancient geologic features started to make far more sense. It is now possible to construct maps that are probably fairly accurate for continental positions over several hundred million years. Before the
CambrianThe Cambrian is the first geological period of the Paleozoic era, lasting from ; it is succeeded by the Ordovician. Its subdivisions, and indeed its base, are somewhat in flux...
era, it becomes much more difficult since there are fewer rock exposures preserved. The state of large regions of the Earth becomes unknowable in the distant past. Where rocks are exposed, latitudes can often be determined from the orientation of preserved magnetic fields but longitudes are based on projections that are increasingly uncertain as one gets further from the present.
Many published maps are associated in one way or another with the work of
Christopher ScoteseChristopher Scotese is geologist at the University of Texas at Arlington. He received his PhD from the University of Chicago in 1985. He is creator of the Paleomap Project, which aims to map Earth over the last billion years, and is credited with predicting Pangaea Ultima, a possible future...
. The maps are useful since is usually quite difficult to describe the location and orientation of geographical features using words alone.
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