Gondwana Massif have been dated at 320–330 million years old, indicating that the subduction process initiated in the early Carboniferous.This was relatively short lived (lasting about 20 million years), and initial contact of the two landmasses occurred in the mid-Carboniferous, with broader collision during the early Permian. In the Devonian an island arc named Chaitenia accreted to Patagonia in what is now south-central Chile. Gondwana and Laurasia formed the Pangaea supercontinent during the Carboniferous. Pangaea began to break up in the Mid-Jurassic when the Central Atlantic opened. In the western end of Pangaea, the collision between Gondwana and Laurasia closed the
South China (continent) Ocean. By the Late Carboniferous (300 million years ago), while North China collided with Siberia and Kazakhstania, completely closing the Proto-Tethys Ocean, South China became an independent continent. For much of the Permian Period, South China remained in the tropical latitudes. And also, while most of the giant lycopods of the Carboniferous disappeared, giant lycopods remained in South China, since its isolation from the now formed Pangaea. Cimmeria, a microcontinent that consisted of today's Tibet, Iran, Turkey, and parts of Southeast Asia rifted away from Gondwana (just as North and South China did earlier), and was heading towards Laurasia. Paleo-Tethys