Mediterranean Sea

The Mediterranean Seaan intercontinental sea between Europe, AfricaAsia covering an approximate area2.5 million kmē.

Map ofMediterranean Sea

The seaconnected toAtlantic Ocean byStraitGibraltar onwesttoSeaMarmaraBlack Sea byDardanelles andBosporus oneast. The SeaMarmaraoften consideredpart ofMediterranean Sea, whereas Black Seanot. The Suez Canal insoutheast connectsMediterranean withRed Sea.

Tidesvery limited because ofnarrow connection withocean.

Its major islands are:

• Cyprus, Crete,Rhodes ineast
• Sardinia, Corsica, Sicily,Malta incenter
• MajorcaMinorca inwest

Countries borderingsea are:

• Spain, France, Monaco, Italy, Slovenia, Croatia, BosniaHerzegovina, Albania, GreeceTurkey onnorth shore
• Lebanon, Syria, Israel andGaza Strip (part ofPalestinian territories), oneast
• Egypt, Libya, Tunisia, AlgeriaMorocco onsouth shore
• The island statesCyprusMalta. The Turkish RepublicNorthern Cyprus also hasMediterranean coastline butrecognised only by Turkey.

The climategenerally onewet wintershot, dry summers. Special crops ofregionolives, grapes, orangess, tangerines,cork. The region haslong historycivilization.

Parts ofMediterraneangiven their own names.

The commonly named seas(from westeast):Ligurian Sea northCorsica,Tyrrhenian Sea enclosed by Sardinia, ItalySicily,Adriatic Sea between Italy andDalmatian coast,Ionian Sea between ItalyGreece,Aegean Sea between GreeceTurkey, withThracian Seaits north,Mirtoon Sea betweenCyclades andPeleponnesus, andSeaCrete northCrete, andSeaMarmara betweenAegeanBlack Seas.

There arelarger numbergulfsstraits as well.

External Links

• Mediterranean directory at Google