Earth’s continents have been shifting throughout the planet’s history as a result of the movement of tectonic plates over the Earth’s mantle. For most of its life, a map of the planet would be totally unrecognizable to people living in the 21st century. 300 million years ago, the 7 modern continents had merged together. This ancient world had only one supercontinent, Pangea, and one massive ocean, Panthalassa, that covered the rest of the globe.
The continent began to split gradually into something more like the modern globe 200 million years ago. First, the ancient continent of Gondwana (made up of India, Africa, Australia, Antarctica, and South America) drifted away from Laurasia (made up of Europe, Asia, and North America). Then Gondwana split into its modern pieces during the Jurassic period 150 million years ago. Laurasia began the long splitting process during the Cretaceous period 65 million years ago. Finally, the continents drifted to their modern positions.
Reddit user LikeWolvesDo made a map with present-day cities and borders drawn onto Pangea, and the result is absolutely bizarre. Asia was completely scrambled: Japan used to be all the way on the opposite side of China in those days, while China was north of Russia. India was divided into pieces on opposite ends of the continent. In the world of Pangea, New Zealand was the closest you could get to the south pole, and Taiwan was nearest the north pole.
The modern 7-continent world is only a brief stop along the way to another totally unrecognizable world. In fact, geologists know that Australia is headed toward Asia, and part of eastern Africa is in the process of splitting from the rest of the continent. Supercontinents tend to form on Earth every 300-400 million years. No one knows why, but we are likely on our way to another supercontinent.