Mediterranean Sea 5.33 mya); "see" animation: Africa-Arabia colliding with Eurasia. Accordingly, the Mediterranean basin consists of several stretched tectonic plates in subduction which are the foundation of the Eastern part of the Mediterranean Sea. Various zones of subduction harbour and form the deepest and most majestic oceanic ridges, east of the Ionian Sea and south of the Aegean. The Central Indian Ridge runs East of the Mediterranean Sea South-East across the in-between of Africa and the Arabian Peninsula into the Indian Ocean. During Mesozoic and Cenozoic times, as the northwest corner of Africa converged on Iberia, it lifted the Betic-Rif mountain belts
The Great Sea: A Human History of the Mediterranean The Great Sea: A Human History of the Mediterranean The Great Sea: A Human History of the Mediterranean is an award-winning book by the British historian David Abulafia. First published in 2011, it is a history of the Mediterranean Sea from 22,000 BC to the present time, and provides one of the most comprehensive treatments of the subject since the works of Fernand Braudel. The book has been critically acclaimed and received the Mountbatten Literary Award from the Maritime Foundation, and the British Academy Medal. It has so far been translated into Dutch, Greek, Turkish, Spanish, Korean, German, Italian, Romanian