Geologic History

of Asia: An Overview
L E C T U R E P R E PA R E D BY:
MARVIN R. SORIANO
D E PA RT M E N T O F S O C I A L S C I E N C ES
C O L L EG E O F A R T S & S O C I A L S C I E N C ES
C E N T R A L L U Z O N S TAT E U N I V E RS I T Y
Introduction
❑ Asia is the world’s largest and most diverse continent. It occupies the
eastern four-fifths of the giant Eurasian landmass. Asia is more a
geographic term than a homogeneous continent, and the use of the
term to describe such a vast area always carries the potential of
obscuring the enormous diversity among the regions it encompasses.
❑ Asia has both the highest and the lowest points on the surface of
Earth, has the longest coastline of any continent, is subject overall to
the world’s widest climatic extremes, and, consequently, produces the
most varied forms of vegetation and animal life on Earth. In addition,
the peoples of Asia have established the broadest variety of human
adaptation found on any of the continents.
Introduction
❑ The name Asia is ancient, and its origin has been variously explained.
The Greeks used it to designate the lands situated to the east of their
homeland. It is believed that the name may be derived from the
Assyrian word asu, meaning “east.”
❑ Another possible explanation is that it was originally a local name
given to the plains of Ephesus, which ancient Greeks and Romans
extended to refer first to Anatolia (contemporary Asia Minor, which is
the western extreme of mainland Asia), and then to the known world
east of the Mediterranean Sea. When Western explorers reached South
and East Asia in early modern times, they extended that label to the
whole of the immense landmass.
Introduction
❑ Asia is bounded by the Arctic Ocean to the north, the Pacific Ocean to
the east, the Indian Ocean to the south, the Red Sea (as well as the
inland seas of the Atlantic Ocean—the Mediterranean and the Black) to
the southwest, and Europe to the west.
❑ Asia is separated from North America to the northeast by the Bering
Strait and from Australia to the southeast by the seas and straits
connecting the Indian and Pacific oceans. The Isthmus of Suez unites
Asia with Africa, and it is generally agreed that the Suez Canal forms the
border between them. Two narrow straits, the Bosporus and the
Dardanelles, separate Anatolia from the Balkan Peninsula.
Çanakkale, Turkey, on the southern coast of
the Dardanelles.
Introduction
❑ The land boundary between Asia and Europe is a historical and
cultural construct that has been defined variously; only as a matter of
agreement is it tied to a specific borderline.
❑ The most convenient geographic boundary—one that has been
adopted by most geographers—is a line that runs south from the Arctic
Ocean along the Ural Mountains and then turns southwest along the
Emba River to the northern shore of the Caspian Sea; west of the
Caspian, the boundary follows the Kuma-Manych Depression to the Sea
of Azov and the Kerch Strait of the Black Sea. Thus, the isthmus
between the Black and Caspian seas, which culminates in the Caucasus
mountain range to the south, is part of Asia.
Introduction
❑ The total area of Asia, including Asian Russia (with the Caucasian
isthmus) but excluding the island of New Guinea, amounts to some
17,226,200 square miles (44,614,000 square km), roughly one-third of
the land surface of Earth. The islands—including Taiwan, those of Japan
and Indonesia, Sakhalin and other islands of Asian Russia, Sri Lanka,
Cyprus, and numerous smaller islands—together constitute 1,240,000
square miles (3,210,000 square km), about 7 percent of the total.
(Although New Guinea is mentioned occasionally in this article, it
generally is not considered a part of Asia.)
❑ The farthest terminal points of the Asian mainland are Cape
Chelyuskin in north-central Siberia, Russia (77°43′ N), to the north; the
tip of the Malay Peninsula, Cape Piai, or Bulus (1°16′ N), to the south;
Cape Baba in Turkey (26°4′ E) to the west; and Cape Dezhnev
(Dezhnyov), or East Cape (169°40′ W), in northeastern Siberia,
overlooking the Bering Strait, to the east.
Introduction
❑ Asia has the highest average elevation of the continents and contains the
greatest relative relief. The tallest peak in the world, Mount Everest, which
reaches an elevation of 29,035 feet (8,850 metres; the lowest place on
Earth’s land surface, the Dead Sea, measured in the mid-2010s at about
1,410 feet (430 metres) below sea level; and the world’s deepest
continental trough, occupied by Lake Baikal, which is 5,315 feet (1,620
metres) deep and whose bottom lies 3,822 feet (1,165 metres) below sea
level, are all located in Asia. Those physiographic extremes and the overall
predominance of mountain belts and plateaus are the result of the collision
of tectonic plates. In geologic terms, Asia comprises several very ancient
continental platforms and other blocks of land that merged over the eons.
Most of those units had coalesced as a continental landmass by about 160
million years ago, when the core of the Indian subcontinent broke off from
Africa and began drifting northeastward to collide with the southern flank
of Asia about 50 million to 40 million years ago. The northeastward
movement of the subcontinent continues at about 2.4 inches (6 cm) per
year. The impact and pressure continue to raise the Plateau of Tibet and the
Himalayas.
Introduction
❑ Asia’s coastline—some 39,000 miles (62,800 km) in length—is,
variously, high and mountainous, low and alluvial, terraced as a result of
the land’s having been uplifted, or “drowned” where the land has
subsided. The specific features of the coastline in some areas—
especially in the east and southeast—are the result of active volcanism;
thermal abrasion of permafrost (caused by a combination of the action
of breaking waves and thawing), as in northeastern Siberia; and coral
growth, as in the areas to the south and southeast. Accreting sandy
beaches also occur in many areas, such as along the Bay of Bengal and
the Gulf of Thailand.
Gulf of Thailand
Island resort in the Gulf of Thailand off the
coast of southern Thailand.
Introduction
❑ The mountain systems of Central Asia not only have provided the
continent’s great rivers with water from their melting snows but also
have formed a forbidding natural barrier that has influenced the
movement of peoples in the area. Migration across those barriers has
been possible only through mountain passes.
❑ A historical movement of population from the arid zones of Central
Asia has followed the mountain passes into the Indian subcontinent.
More recent migrations have originated in China, with destinations
throughout Southeast Asia. The Korean and Japanese peoples and, to a
lesser extent, the Chinese have remained ethnically more homogeneous
than the populations of other Asian countries.
High pass through the Himalayas, Tibet Autonomous Region,
China, part of the historic caravan trail to the Central Asian trade
routes. © Holger Mette/Shutterstock.com
Introduction
❑ Asia’s population is unevenly distributed, mainly because of climatic
factors. There is a concentration of population in western Asia as well as
great concentrations in the Indian subcontinent and the eastern half of
China. There are also appreciable concentrations in the Pacific
borderlands and on the islands, but vast areas of Central and North
Asia—whose forbidding climates limit agricultural productivity—have
remained sparsely populated. Nonetheless, Asia, the most populous of
the continents, contains some three-fifths of the world’s people.
❑ Asia is the birthplace of all the world’s major religions—Buddhism,
Christianity, Hinduism, Islam, and Judaism—and of many minor ones. Of
those, only Christianity developed primarily outside of Asia; it exerts
little influence on the continent, though many Asian countries have
Christian minorities. Buddhism has had a greater impact outside its
birthplace in India and is prevalent in various forms in China, South
Korea, Japan, the Southeast Asian countries, and Sri Lanka. Islam has
spread out of Arabia eastward to South and Southeast Asia. Hinduism
has been mostly confined to the Indian subcontinent.
Geologic History
❑ Asia is not only Earth’s largest continent but also its youngest and
structurally most-complicated one. Although Asia’s evolution began
almost four billion years ago, more than half of the continent remains
seismically active, and new continental material is currently being
produced in the island arc systems that surround it to the east and
southeast. In such places, new land is continuously emerging and is
added to the bulk of the continent by episodic collisions of the island
arcs with the mainland.
❑ Asia also contains the greatest mountain mass on Earth’s surface: the
Plateau of Tibet and the bordering mountains of the Himalayas,
Karakoram Range, Hindu Kush, Pamirs, Kunlun Mountains, and Tien
Shan.
Geologic History
❑ By virtue of its enormous size and relative youth, Asia contains many
of the morphological extremes of Earth’s land surface—such as its
highest and lowest points, longest coastline, and largest area of
continental shelf. Asia’s immense mountain ranges, varied coastline,
and vast continental plains and basins have had a profound effect on
the course of human history.
❑ The fact that Asia produces vast quantities of fossil fuels—petroleum,
natural gas, and coal—in addition to being a significant contributor to
the global production of many minerals (e.g., about three-fifths of the
world’s tin) heavily underlines the importance of its geology for the
welfare of the world’s population.
Kailas Range
Northern side of Kangrinboqê Peak (Mount Kailas), in the
Kailas Range, Trans-Himalayas, Tibet Autonomous Region,
China. (Ondřej Žváček)
Geologic History
❑ By virtue of its enormous size and relative youth, Asia contains many
of the morphological extremes of Earth’s land surface—such as its
highest and lowest points, longest coastline, and largest area of
continental shelf. Asia’s immense mountain ranges, varied coastline,
and vast continental plains and basins have had a profound effect on
the course of human history.
❑ The fact that Asia produces vast quantities of fossil fuels—petroleum,
natural gas, and coal—in addition to being a significant contributor to
the global production of many minerals (e.g., about three-fifths of the
world’s tin) heavily underlines the importance of its geology for the
welfare of the world’s population.
Tectonic framework
❑ The morphology of Asia masks an extremely complex geologic history
that predates the active deformations largely responsible for the
existing landforms.
❑ Tectonic units (regions that once formed or now form part of a single
tectonic plate and whose structures derive from the formation and
motion of that plate) that are defined on the basis of active structures
in Asia are not identical to those defined on the basis of its fossil (i.e.,
now inactive) structures. It is therefore convenient to discuss the
tectonic framework of Asia in terms of two separate maps, one showing
its paleotectonic (i.e., older tectonic) units and the other displaying its
neotectonic (new and presently active) units.
Tectonic framework
❑ According to the theory of plate tectonics, forces within Earth propel
sections of its crust on various courses, with the result that continents
are formed and oceans are opened and closed. Oceans commonly open
by rifting—by tearing a continent asunder—and close along subduction
zones, which are inclined planes along which ocean floors sink beneath
an adjacent tectonic plate and are assimilated into Earth’s mantle.
❑ Ocean closure culminates in continental collision and may involve the
accretion of vast tectonic collages, including small continental
fragments, island arcs, large deposits of sediment, and occasional
fragments of ocean-floor material. In defining the units to draw Asia’s
paleotectonic map, it is useful to outline such accreted objects and the
lines, or sutures, along which they are joined.
Tectonic framework
❑ Continuing convergence following collision may further disrupt an
already assembled tectonic collage along new, secondary lines,
especially by faulting. Postcollisional disruption also may reactivate
some of the old tectonic lines (sutures).
❑ Those secondary structures dominate and define the neotectonic
units of Asia. It should be mentioned, however, that most former
continental collisions also have led to the generation of secondary
structures that add to the structural diversity of the continent.
Chronological summary:
Precambrian
❑ The recorded history of the Precambrian, which covers more than 80
percent of Earth’s geologic history, is divided into two eons: the
Archean, between roughly 4 and 2.5 billion years ago, and the
Proterozoic, between 2.5 billion and 541 million years ago.
❑ In Asia rocks of Archean age are found in the Angaran and Indian
platforms, in the North China and the Yangtze paraplatforms, and in
smaller fragments caught up in younger orogenic belts such as the
North Tarim fragment. In all those places especially, the early Archean
evolution was dominated by intrusions of granodiorite that largely
represented subduction-related magmatism and by the formation and
deformation of greenstone belts that are probably relicts of old oceanic
crust and mantle and immature (i.e., basalt-rich) island arcs.
Chronological summary:
The Precambrian
❑ In India the more than 3-billion-year-old mafic-ultramafic associations
of Kolar type with only subordinate sedimentary rocks represent the old
greenstone belts that have either intrusive or tectonic contacts with
Peninsular gneiss of similar age. The so-called Sargur schist belts within
the Peninsular gneiss may be the oldest suture zones in the Indian
subcontinent.
❑ In the Angaran platform the older (i.e., more than 3 billion years)
gneiss-granulite basement shows a progressive development in time
from ophiolites (pieces of former ocean floors) and immature basaltic
island-arc volcanic rocks to more silicic (silicon-rich) rocks such as
andesites. In the North China paraplatform that early episode
corresponds to the Qianxi Stage (3.5 to 3 billion years ago), in which
mafic-ultramafic rocks with silicic sediments developed concurrently
with granitic gneisses that were metamorphosed to a high degree.
Chronological summary:
The Paleozoic Era
❑ The tectonic events in Asia of the Paleozoic Era (about 541 to 252
million years ago) may be summarized under three categories: events in
the Altaids, events in the Tethysides, and events in the continental
nuclei.
❑ The identification of Asian Paleozoic tectonic events with those
associated with the Caledonian and Hercynian orogenies of Europe, as
was done in the older literature, largely has been abandoned owing to
the recognition of the haphazard nature of tectonic events whose
temporal limits widely overlap.

❑ For further discussion on the Paleozoic Era, you may want to visit this
link: https://www.livescience.com/37584-paleozoic-
era.html#:~:text=The%20Paleozoic%20Era%2C%20which%20ran,first%2
0vertebrate%20animals%20colonized%20land.
Chronological summary:
The Mesozoic Era
❑ The tectonic events in Asia of the Paleozoic Era (about 541 to 252
million years ago) may be summarized under three categories: events in
the Altaids, events in the Tethysides, and events in the continental
nuclei.
❑ The identification of Asian Paleozoic tectonic events with those
associated with the Caledonian and Hercynian orogenies of Europe, as
was done in the older literature, largely has been abandoned owing to
the recognition of the haphazard nature of tectonic events whose
temporal limits widely overlap.

❑ For further discussion on the Paleozoic Era, you may want to visit this
link: https://www.livescience.com/37584-paleozoic-
era.html#:~:text=The%20Paleozoic%20Era%2C%20which%20ran,first%2
0vertebrate%20animals%20colonized%20land.