Mediterranean Sea

the great inland sea of the Old World. The name signifies between worlds. It lies between Europe, Africa, and Asia. The Mediterranean lies in a hot, dry climate. The waters are intensely blue and very salt. Three times as much water is evaporated from its surface as is received from the Nile, Hellespont, Po, and other rivers. A western current sets in through the Strait of Gibraltar to make up the deficiency. The sea was at one time a much larger body of water extending eastward into Central Asia beyond the Caspian and the Aral. The present length from the Strait of Gibraltar to Syria is 2,200 miles; its greatest width is 500 miles; the greatest depth, 13,000 feet. The area is about 900,000 square miles.

Owing to the narrowness of the Strait of Gibraltar, the tides are those of a lake rather than those of an ocean. The tides vary from a few inches to six feet. Shallows, reaching from Italy by way of Sicily to the coast of Tunis, divide the Mediterranean into two basins, an eastern and a western. The western basin is comparatively regular in outline, the deepest gulfs being those of Lyons and Genoa. Sardinia, Corsica, and the Balearic Isles are situated in this basin. The eastern basin is very irregular. Two arms are known as the Adriatic and the Aegean. The principal islands are Cyprus, Rhodes, Crete, and Malta. The waters of the Mediterranean are noted for fisheries, including sardines, sponges, and corals. The Mediterranean is the most noted body of water in history. Its shores were in all probability the seat of the earliest civilization.