continents

1. The large parts of the surface of the Earth that rise above sea level. The seven major continents are Africa , Antarctica , Asia , Australia , Europe , North America , and South America .

Notes

According to the theory of plate tectonics , continents move along piggy-back on the tectonic plates like rafts floating on water.

Continents are made from the lightest rocks in the Earth. Some of these are also the oldest known rocks on Earth, with an age of 3.5 billion years, measured by radioactive dating .

Example Sentences

When the artist themselves is often continents away, those artistic decisions are made by the artisan.

From The Daily Beast

With an unprecedented epidemic spreading across countries and continents, including our own, it should give us reason, too.

From The Daily Beast

In the seven months since the epidemic began, Ebola has spread across borders, countries, and now continents.

From The Daily Beast

Mars has no tectonic plates—no continents, in other words—and no ginormous moon.

From The Daily Beast

How a 1,000-year-old fragrant elixir traveled over continents and time to become the signature drink of the Kentucky Derby.

From The Daily Beast

This covering extends rather less far toward the planet's equator than does the snow sheet on our continents.

From Project Gutenberg

These occur on the continents, especially where they afford broad plains little interrupted by mountain ranges.

From Project Gutenberg

In general, the central parts of continents are likely to receive much less rainfall than their peripheral portions.

From Project Gutenberg

The isthmus which joined the two great continents of the New World remained, according to him, unappropriated.

From Project Gutenberg

Who is surprised now to see that the electric telegraph instantly sends human thought across continents and seas?

From Project Gutenberg