The content of the Mediterranean Encyclopedia comes from the Mediterranean Sea, which is surrounded by the European continent in the north, the African continent in the south and the Asian continent in the east. It is about 4, kilometers long from east to west, 1,8 kilometers wide from north to south and covers an area of 2.516 million square kilometers. It is the largest land sea in the world. It is divided into east and west parts by the Apennine Peninsula, the Tunisian Strait between Sicily and Tunisia. The average depth is 145 meters and the deepest is 592 meters. The Mediterranean Sea is one of the oldest seas in the world, and its history is even older than that of the Atlantic Ocean. The Mediterranean Sea is also one of the strong earthquake zones in the world.
Introduction
Satellite map of the Mediterranean Sea. The western part of the Mediterranean Sea is connected with the Atlantic Ocean through the Strait of Gibraltar, and the eastern part is connected with the Black Sea through the Turkish Strait (Da Daniil Strait, Bosporus Strait and MarMalakhei). The western end communicates with the Atlantic Ocean through the Strait of Gibraltar, and the narrowest point is only 13 kilometers (8 miles). The waterway is relatively shallow. The northeast is connected to the Black Sea by the Da Daniil Strait-MarMalakhei-Bosporus Strait. The southeast communicates with the Red Sea through the Suez Canal opened in the 19th century.
The Mediterranean coast is hot and dry in summer and warm and humid in winter, which is called Mediterranean climate. Vegetation, with hard leaves, waxy leaves and deep roots, has the characteristics of drought tolerance to adapt to the dry and hot climate in summer, and belongs to subtropical evergreen hardwood forest. It is a major subtropical fruit producing area in Europe, rich in citrus, figs and grapes, as well as woody oil crop olive.
The earliest Jews and ancient Greeks called it "sea" or "sea" for short. Because ancient people only knew that this sea was located between three continents, it was called "Mediterranean". The full name means "the sea in the middle of the land", and the name began to appear in ancient books in the 3rd century. In the 7th century AD, the Spanish writer Isir took the Mediterranean as a geographical name for the first time.
The geographical Mediterranean was once considered as the remnant of Tethys Sea which used to surround the old hemisphere. Its continental shelf is relatively shallow. The widest continental shelf is located in Gabes Bay on the east coast of Tunisia, with a length of 275km (17 miles). Most of the seabed of Adriatic Sea is also continental shelf. The Mediterranean sea floor is a sediment composed of lime, mud and sand, and the following is blue mud. The coast is generally steep and rocky, and it is deeply serrated. The Longhe River, the Po River and the Nile River constitute only a few large deltas in the Mediterranean. The continuous injection of Atlantic surface water is the main supplementary source of Mediterranean sea water. The whole Mediterranean basin is active in structure and earthquakes often occur. It is one of the strong earthquake zones in the world. Here the underwater crust is broken, earthquakes and volcanoes are frequent, and the world-famous Mount Vesuvius and Mount Etna are distributed in this area.
There is a ridge between Sicily and the African continent that divides the Mediterranean Sea into two parts. There are three main basins separated by seamounts in the western Mediterranean. From west to east, they are Alboran basin, Algerian basin and Lenient basin. The eastern Mediterranean is the Ionian basin (the Adriatic Sea in the northwest) and the Levantine basin (the Aegean Sea in the northwest). The big islands in the Mediterranean are Majorca, Corsica, Sardinia, Sicily, Crete, Cyprus and Rhode Island. The three major peninsulas in southern Europe and the islands of Sicily, Sardinia and Corsica divide the Mediterranean into several small sea areas: Goulias Sea, tyrrhenian sea Sea, Adriatic Sea, Ionian Sea and Aegean Sea.
The Mediterranean sea floor is undulating, with ridges and basins staggered. The line from Apennine Peninsula and Sicily to Tunisia in Africa is the boundary, which divides the Mediterranean into two parts: east and west. The eastern Mediterranean is much larger than the western Mediterranean, and the seabed is rugged and uneven in depth. The shallowest part is only tens of meters (such as the northern Adriatic Sea), and the deepest part can reach more than 4, meters (such as the Ionian Sea).
climate environment
Mediterranean scenery The Mediterranean climate is characterized by dry heat and little rain in summer and warm and humid in winter, which makes the surrounding rivers full of rain in winter and dry up in summer. Mediterranean Scenery The Mediterranean climate is characterized by: controlled by westerlies in winter, frequent frontal cyclones, mild climate, the coldest average monthly temperature of 4-1℃ and abundant precipitation. In summer, under the control of subtropical high, the airflow sinks, the climate is hot and dry, the clouds are sparse and the sunshine is abundant. The annual precipitation is 3-1mm, accounting for 6%-7% in winter and only 3%-4% in summer. The climate characteristics of winter rain and dry summer are unique among various climate types in the world.
The distribution law of Mediterranean climate is located on the west coast of the mainland between 3-4 degrees north and south latitude. Mediterranean climate is the only climate type that exists on all continents except Antarctica. Among the distribution areas of Mediterranean climate, the Mediterranean coast is the most obvious. Other areas such as California coast in North America, central Chile in South America, Cape of Good Hope at the southern tip of Africa and the southwestern and southeastern coasts of Australia. Most of its distribution areas are economically developed and are also hot spots in the world.
strategic position
Mediterranean
prominent traffic position
Mediterranean occupies an important position in both traffic and strategy. It can reach the Atlantic Ocean via the Strait of Gibraltar in the west, the Black Sea via the Turkish Strait in the northeast, and the Red Sea to the Indian Ocean via the Suez Canal in the southeast. It is an important waterway between Europe, Asia and Africa, and also an important channel to communicate between the Atlantic Ocean and the Indian Ocean. Important coastal seaports include Gibraltar (Britain), Marseille (France), Genoa, Naples (Italy), Split, Rijeka (Croatia), Durres (Albania), Algiers (Algeria), Port Said (Egypt) and so on.
Military significance
The Mediterranean is the transportation hub of Europe, Asia and Africa, and the shortcut between the Atlantic Ocean, the Indian Ocean and the Pacific Ocean, so it plays an extremely important role in economy, politics and military affairs. For a long time, the Mediterranean has become a place for great powers to compete. In the early 18th century, Britain once regarded the Mediterranean as its "inner lake". At the beginning of the 19th century, when Napoleon ran across Europe, he tried to seize British control of the Mediterranean. During the First World War, the Mediterranean Sea became an active area for the navies of both warring parties. In World War II, the German and Italian navies fought fiercely with the British navy in the Mediterranean. Today, the western powers are engaged in increasingly fierce competition in the Mediterranean. Since the Second World War, the Sixth Fleet of the United States has always been based in the Mediterranean Sea, and naval vessels of some western powers often cruise here, which intensifies the tension. In order to protect national sovereignty and security, coastal countries have put forward that "the Mediterranean is the Mediterranean of Mediterranean coastal countries" and demanded that all the fleets and military bases of military powers withdraw from the Mediterranean.
Economic and trade ports
In p>1869, the Suez Canal was opened for navigation, and the southeast Mediterranean was connected with the Red Sea through the Suez Canal, and then went out of the Indian Ocean through the Red Sea. From then on, from western Europe to the Indian Ocean, the shortcut of crossing the Gibraltar Strait-Mediterranean Sea-Suez Canal-Red Sea was more than 1, kilometers less than that around the Cape of Good Hope in southern Africa, which made the Mediterranean become the busiest sea route in the world. At present, there are about 2 ships sailing in the Mediterranean every day. About 85% of the oil imported from western Europe is transported through the Mediterranean.
The Mediterranean Sea, as an intercontinental sea, is relatively calm. In addition, the coastal coastline is tortuous and there are many islands, and it has many natural and good ports, which has become a traffic artery connecting the three continents. Such conditions have made the Mediterranean Sea prosperous in maritime trade since ancient times. It has also played an important role in the rise and development of ancient Egyptian civilization, Babylonian civilization and ancient Greek civilization, and has become the cradle of ancient Egyptian civilization, ancient Greek civilization and Roman empire. Now it is also one of the important places of maritime traffic in the world. Phoenicians, Cretes, Greeks, and later Portuguese and Spanish are all nations with developed maritime industry. Famous navigators such as Columbus, Da Gama, Magellan, etc. all came from countries along the Mediterranean coast.
main resources
Mediterranean marine resources The Mediterranean Sea is the main subtropical fruit producing area in Europe, rich in citrus, figs and grapes, as well as woody oil crop olive. Due to the lack of phosphate and nitrate necessary for marine life in seawater, the Mediterranean fish resources are not very rich. There is a small-scale fishing industry. The most important fish are hake, sole, sole, turbot, sardine, anchovy, bluefin tuna, silver carp and mackerel. Shellfish, corals, sponges and seaweed are also produced. Excessive collection of marine animals and plants is still a serious problem.
Oil has been discovered along the coasts of Spain, Sicily, Libya and Tunisia, and natural gas has been discovered in the Adriatic Sea. The local specialties are olives, oranges, grapes and cork. Tourism is an important source of income for many countries along the Mediterranean coast.
Because the Mediterranean Sea is the largest land sea, with warm and rainy winter, hotter and drier, higher seawater temperature and very strong evaporation, the salinity of seawater is as high as 39‰, and salt production has become an important economic activity in coastal countries. Because the geographical environment around the Mediterranean is almost land, it has caused serious obstacles to the circulation of seawater, and the mixing of oxygen and nutrients on which marine life depends has been seriously blocked, which has become the main reason why the creatures in the Mediterranean are scarce compared with other creatures near the mainland.
Important Islands
The coastline of Sardinia in the Mediterranean Sea is tortuous and there are many islands. The big islands are Majorca, Corsica, Sardinia, Sicily, Crete, Cyprus and Rhodes. Sicily is the largest island in the Mediterranean, followed by Sardinia, Cyprus, Corsica and Crete.
Cyprus
Cyprus is an island country in the eastern Mediterranean, south of Turkey. Phoenicians settled here at least in 8 BC, and were later occupied by Assyrians, Egyptians, Persians, Macedonian Greeks, Egyptians and Romans (58 BC). Byzantium ruled the area from 395 to 1191, and was occupied by English Rechard Ⅰ during the Third Crusade. It was annexed by Venice in 1489. Conquered by Turkey in 1571. Great Britain declared its sovereignty in 1914. Cyprus became independent in 196. Nicosia is the capital and the largest city with a population of 642,731. At present, there are two main groups living in Cyprus: Turks and Greeks.
Corsica
Corsica is 193 kilometers from the coast, and on the southeast coast of France, with an area of 8,48 square kilometers, it is the fourth largest island in the Mediterranean Islands with about 55, inhabitants. Between the lush mountains and the blue sea, Cossiga Island is an excellent holiday resort. Corsica, like several other islands, is full of turmoil. It was first colonized by Phoenicians, once occupied by Romans, then occupied by Pisa and Genoa, and became French territory in 1769. This state has been preserved to this day. This island not only produced Napoleon, a famous political figure, but also produced many navigators and map makers, including many Arabs.
malta island malta island
Malta is also an island that cannot be ignored. The whole territory consists of five islands, of which malta island is the largest, with an area of 316 square kilometers, which is located at the junction of the eastern and western Mediterranean. Malta, located in an island country in the middle of the Mediterranean, is known as the "heart of the Mediterranean". The coastline is 18 kilometers long. It has a subtropical Mediterranean climate. The annual average temperature is 21.3 degrees, the highest temperature is 4 degrees, and the lowest temperature is 5 degrees. The average annual precipitation is 56mm. The population of the island is mainly composed of Arabs, sicilian, (French) Normans, Spaniards, Italians and British. The locals speak English and a Marta language with Semitic characteristics, and many people speak Italian. Everyone believes in Roman Catholicism. In history, Malta was first occupied by Phoenicians, then by Greeks, then by Carthaginians and finally by Romans. Then Arabs, Normans, Turks and finally Napoleon. In the early 19th century, the British expelled the French and became a British colony.
There are 19 coastal countries, which are divided into:
European countries: (from west to east) Spain, France, Monaco, Italy, Malta, Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Montenegro, Albania and Greece.
Asian countries: (from north to south) Turkey, Syria, Cyprus (island), Lebanon, Israel, and Palestinian autonomous government.
African countries with Mediterranean scenery: (from east to west) Egypt, Libya, Tunisia, Algeria and Morocco.
countries that have been active near the Mediterranean:
Kingdom of Egypt
Hittite Empire. Hittites are ancient tribes living in northern Syria and Asia Minor from 2 to 12 BC.
Kingdom of Israel
Kingdom of Judea: ancient southern Palestine, including present-day southern Israel and southwest Jordan. When Jesus was alive, it was a kingdom ruled by Herod, and it was also a part of the Syrian province of the Roman Empire.
Assyrian Empire
Babylonian Empire
Persian Empire
Macedonian N&; Greek Empire Macedonian and Greek Empire
Roman Empire Roman Empire
Byzantine Empire Byzantine Empire
Sassanid Empire Sassan Dynasty: a dynasty of Persia (A.D. 224-651) and the last king of Persia before the Arab conquest. The Sasan era was marked by wars against Romans, Armenians and Huns and the revival of Zoroastrianism.
The Caliphate caliphate (Islamic Empire)
The Crusader Kingdom during the Crusader Kingdom
Saladin's Empire Saladin Empire
Mongolian Empire
Ottoman Empire Turkish Empire
European Coloni.
Politics
Union for the Mediterranean
In July p>29, the Union for the Mediterranean, which was "nurtured" and "spawned" by French President Nicolas Sarkozy, was restarted in alism in July after more than half a year of silence. At the request of France, representatives from 43 countries of the Union jointly reviewed the future development direction. Although France has high hopes for the smooth operation of the alliance, it may not be easy with the increasingly complicated situation in the Middle East. The Mediterranean Union was restarted in Paris this time, and France has thrown out a new concept, that is, only the cooperation plan will follow the lead, in other words, all countries will discuss it.