Land Bridge Theory
In the 19th century a number of scientists noted puzzling geological and zoological similarities between widely separated areas. To solve these problems, "…whenever geologists and paleontologists were at a loss to explain the obvious transoceanic similarities of life that they deduced from the fossil records, they sharpened their pencils and sketched land bridges between appropriate continents." The concept was first proposed by Jules Marcou in Lettres sur les roches du Jura.
These hypothetical land bridges included:
- Archatlantis from the West Indies to North Africa
- Archhelenis from Brazil to South Africa
- Archiboreis in the North Atlantic
- Archigalenis from Central America through Hawaii to Northeast Asia
- Archinotis from South America to Antarctica
- Lemuria in the Indian Ocean
All of these became obsolete with the gradual acceptance of continental drift and the development of plate tectonics by the mid-20th century.
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