supercontinent
noun
su·per·con·ti·nent
| \ ˈsü-pər-ˌkän-tə-nənt
, -ˌkänt-nənt\
, -ˌkänt-nənt\
Definition of supercontinent
: a hypothetical former large continent from which other continents are held to have broken off and drifted away
Examples of supercontinent in a Sentence
Recent Examples on the Web
Modern-day Morocco is located where the southern supercontinent Gondwana would have been at the time the stegosaur was alive. — Jason Daley, Smithsonian, "New Species of Stegosaurus Unearthed in Mountains of Morocco," 22 Aug. 2019 Our discovery of Lingwulong demonstrates that several different types of advanced sauropods must have existed at least 15 million years earlier and spread across the world while the supercontinent Pangaea was still a coherent landmass. — David Grossman, Popular Mechanics, "New 'Amazing Dragon' Dinosaur Upends What We Thought We Knew About Sauropods," 26 July 2018 Modeling shows us Pangea, the one-time supercontinent that Antarctica was part of and that, over time, split into South America, Africa, India and Australia, and the fossil record across these places makes the case for the former connection. — Steve Johnson, chicagotribune.com, "'Antarctic Dinosaurs' bring new ice age to Field Museum," 13 June 2018 Within the span of about 30 million years that followed, the Captorhinus had spread across Pangaea, so its adaptive techniques worked to the reptile’s advantage, allowing it to thrive and spread across the supercontinent. — National Geographic, "Ancient Animal Could Take Itself Apart to Escape Predators," 7 Mar. 2018 Back then, flowers had not yet developed, and the world’s land was clumped together in a supercontinent called Pangaea. — Laura Yan, Popular Mechanics, "Meet the 240-Million-Year-Old "Mother of All Lizards"," 3 June 2018 As the ancient supercontinent Rodinia was breaking apart, these rocks formed in shallow waters with the aid of microbial marine organisms—a sign that the same location was warm just a bit earlier in time, Maclennan explains. — Lucas Joel, Science | AAAS, "Ancient Earth froze over in a geologic instant," 7 June 2018 When megachirella walked the Earth, in the middle Triassic period, the world's land masses were crushed together in a supercontinent called Pangaea. — Sarah Kaplan, chicagotribune.com, "Meet the 240-million-year-old 'mother of all lizards'," 30 May 2018 The find also suggests that the division of the prehistoric supercontinent Pangea continued for about 15 million years later than experts previously thought. — James Rogers, Fox News, "Discovery of 'reptilian-mammal' fossil could rewrite history," 29 May 2018These example sentences are selected automatically from various online news sources to reflect current usage of the word 'supercontinent.' Views expressed in the examples do not represent the opinion of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback.
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