Africa is the second-largest and second most-populous continent in the globe after Asia. The region got its name from the word “Afri”. It was to be the name of several people who used to live in the region of North Africa near Carthage. However there is another theory that asserts the name Africa originates in the word afar or Irfan meaning “cave” with regard to the cave dwellers.
The continent covers an area of almost 30.2 million km² or 11.7 million sq mi. that includes the adjacent islands as well. This indicates that Africa extends over 6% of the Earth’s total surface along with 20.4% of the total land area. In the whole continent the population of almost 922 million people divided among 61 territories does exist. This also happens to be 14.2% of the global human population.
The physical features of the continent are marvelous. While the Mediterranean Sea surrounds Africa to the north and the Suez Canal and the Red Sea to the northeast, the Indian Ocean surrounds it to the southeast and Atlantic Ocean to the west. It should be noted always that in the continent there is the presence of 53 countries that comprises Madagascar along with several island groups.
Africa, apart from its inherent mysticism, is known for different other aspects as well. Among the entire continent the central eastern Africa is the most preferred place to the international scientific community as the earliest forms of human beings originated from this area. Lots of discoveries have identified the remnants of the pre-historic species that once trod on the earth at different stages of the human history. The earliest of them have been dated to around seven million years ago. This includes Sahelanthropus tchadensis, Australopithecus africanus, A. afarensis, Homo erectus, H. habilis, H. ergaster along with the earliest specimens of Homo Sapiens.
Africa extends over the equator and encompasses a lot of climate areas. It is also the only continent that stretches from the northern temperate to southern temperate zones.
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