Description
With a radius of 5432 km, Ea has only about three quarters the surface area of Earth (though it's still considerably larger than, say, Mars). It has two main continents - the longitudinally-oriented Inanna, which almost reaches the South Pole, and the latitudinally-oriented Dumuzi, entirely located in the northern hemisphere - as well as a lesser one - the mountainous Enlil, in the southeastern portion of the map. Together, they enclose the Abzu Ocean, while the Nammu Ocean stretches on the opposite face of Ea.
From the tectonic plates, their boundaries and movement, we can trace continents, continental shelves, ocean ridges (where plates diverge) and trenches (when an ocean plate slides below another), as well as mountain ranges (where two continental plates meet). Inanna, Dumuzi, and Enlil were once part of a Pangaea-like supercontinent (you can still see a vast bay on the southern shore of Dumuzi where Enlil once fit), but they have been drifting apart for two hundred million years. New crust is generated in the process, producing the ridge that cuts Abzu in half. Massive mountain ranges form the "spine" of Inanna and Dumuzi, formed as the two larger continents crashed against the surrounding plates. Enlil has a very complex geology, produced by a combination of convergence and divergence. A rare case of a continental divergence has created a lake-filled rift in Enlil's eastern region. Two mantle hotspots have created chains of oceanic islands, while a third one resulted in a strongly volcanic region on the west coast of Inanna.
Other works in the sequence:
- Introduction
- Continents, oceans, and mountain ranges
- Prevalent winds and patterns of rain
- Climate zones and ocean currents
- Major toponyms
- Vegetation, coral reefs, and selected ecosystems
- Human presence
- UNSS Utnapishtim
- Earth in 2070
EDIT 29-08-20: changed some of the colors to be more visible.