Antarctica and Gondwana (Part of History)

Doshi's deepest wonder on reaching Antarctica is that India and Antarctica were once part of the same landmass. She explains that six hundred and fifty million years ago a giant amalgamated southern supercontinent — Gondwana — existed, centred roughly around present-day Antarctica. Things were very different then: humans had not yet arrived, the climate was much warmer, and the land hosted a huge variety of flora and fauna. Gondwana thrived for some five hundred million years.

Then, around the time the dinosaurs were wiped out and the age of mammals got under way, the landmass was forced to separate into the countries we know today, shaping the globe much as it is now. Doshi imagines this drift vividly: India pushing northwards and jamming against Asia to buckle its crust and form the Himalayas, and South America drifting off to join North America, opening up the Drake Passage and creating a cold circumpolar current that keeps Antarctica frigid, desolate and at the bottom of the world. …