1902.] AND ANCIENT GEOGRAPHY. 371 



while sea again occupied it in the Miocene, and thus we would 

 have a chance for the African fauna to reach Northern Spain as 

 early as the Oligocene. This connection, however, scarcely 

 amounted to a complete communication of Africa and Europe, 

 since at that time the Oligocene strait to the north of the Iberian 

 Meseta was still in existence, forming a barrier to the further 

 advance of the African fauna. Thus, even under this assumption, 

 a final connection of Africa and Europe was not established until 

 the end of the Miocene, after the second obliteration of the Betic 

 Strait. Subsequently the connection of both continents was again 

 interrupted by the formation of the Strait of Gibraltar; but this 

 belongs to very recent times. 1 



Another tectonic line goes from Northwestern Africa to Sicily 

 and Italy, and is marked by the eastern continuation of the same 

 mountain range that curves in the west from Afgica into Southern 

 Spain. This system belongs to Post Oligocerfe times, and as a 

 land-bridge apparently underwent repeated changes. Moreover, it 

 is doubtful whether it existed at any time as a complete and solid 

 bridge, but it is represented as such by Scharff (1895, maps pp. 465 

 and 470) for the Pliocene time, 2 while Neumayr (1890, Vol. 1, p. 

 330), for the Lower Pliocene, gives only a series of islands. 



From the above discussion we are to draw the conclusion that — 

 aside from a connection with the Sinic continent during the Upper 



1 Kobelt, W. {Studien zur Zoogeographie — " 2. Die Fauna der meditevranen 

 Subregion," 1898), arrives at a diffeient conclusion. According to him, the 

 Mediterranean Sea was separated Irom the Atlantic Ocean in the Older Tertiary 

 by a connection ot C-ntral Spain with the Atlas mountains (the Sietra Nevada 

 or Betic Cordilleras did not then exist). The Miocene Tethys reached from India 

 to Spain and Central France, but did not communicate with the Atlantic, the 

 connection along the valley of the Guadalquivir being of Pliocene age. 



This result is contrary, however, as we have seen, to what is known of the 

 Geology of these parts. Just the opposite is the case. In the Older Tertiary the 

 Tethys and the Atlantic were broadly connected, and in the Miocene ihey still 

 communicated through the Andalusiau or Betic Strait, as is positively shown by 

 the presence of Miocene beds there. But in Pliocene times this strait was dry 

 land. 



2 According to Scharff (in 1897, PP- 4^1 an( ^ 466), this bridge belongs to the 

 Upper Pliocene and Gla:ial limes. We shall become acquainted below with the 

 evidence for its existence as an actually connecting bridge. 



