Before Pangaea

In 1860, Phillip Slater, the secretary of the British Zoological Society, came up with an interesting theory. He discovered over 29 different kinds of lemur species in Madagascar, which was significantly more than just 12 species in the entire African continent and three in the Indian subcontinent. He realized that Madagascar was the primordial homeland or “ground zero” of lemur development and evolution. Somehow, lemurs crossed oceans to get to Africa and India, or there must have been an ancient land bridge that once connected the two continents to Madagascar.

He called this land bridge “Lemuria”, and it might have been as big as a continent to occupy most of the western Indian Ocean. While his theory might have been interesting, at the time, it wasn’t so – pardon the pun – earth moving. Other observant geologists and scientists also believed that our planet did not always look like it does today – or as it did during the Victorian period. Theories of lost continents began to make the rounds of scientific communities, stating that continents, due to underground earthquakes, for example, just crumbled and sank into the ocean. / https://topdocumentaryfilms.com /