The Role of the Mediterranean Sea

Lesson Plan - Get It!

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The gap that separates North Africa from Spain is only a few miles wide.

In fact, the two continents are so close that an architect once suggested a dam be built between the two to drain the Mediterranean Sea!

Watch the video below to hear about this bizarre plan.

People who lived along the Mediterranean Sea hated this idea.

• Can you blame them?

Look at these beautiful locations along the Mediterranean coast and imagine them replaced with infertile land.

The people who lived in this area certainly had superficial reasons for wanting to throw out this plan altogether; however, the presence of the Mediterranean Sea has much more far-reaching effects than creating a beautiful coastal city.

Characteristics of a Mediterranean Climate

The presence of the Mediterranean Sea creates a regional climate on its coast that is different than simply being on the coast of an ocean.

The coasts of Italy, Spain, Greece, and Lebanon are not usual coastlines.

The space that the Atlantic Ocean filled in was once an enormous valley bordered by mountains over 15,000 feet tall. Once the water came in, the only pieces of land that survived were the tops of these mountain ranges.

This means that cities like Barcelona, Rome, and Athens are at the top of former mountains!

• What effect does this unique flooding have on the climate?

Look at this satellite image of Lebanon showing the Mediterranean Sea on the left and the mountain range in white.

Lebanon is located at the eastern reach of the Mediterranean and is a prime example of moisture movement on this sea. The westward side of its mountains captures the moisture from the water, fertilizing the entire western portion of the country. You can see the green in the image.

• What does the eastern side of the mountains look like?

It rapidly becomes a desert.

This effect contributes to the Mediterranean climate's wet winters and dry summers. Because temperatures rarely get very cold, agriculture in this area has been incredibly easy.

Unlike other fertile lands, such as the Nile or Tigris and Euphrates Valley, the annual flooding of a river was never a factor people had to worry about here. For example, it took the Chinese centuries to develop a canal system to manage the flooding of their land.

This type of taming of nature was not necessary here because the rivers in the Mediterranean were not massive waterways and the lifeblood of the cities; the sea was.

Resources

Because the coastline was formerly the top of a mountain range, civilizations have few resources to harvest. The Greeks, Romans, and later European nations coveted gold so much because the region was heavily void of precious metals.

• What resources are present?

A primary resource in the Mediterranean has always been salt. Salt was a handy resource before refrigeration became prevalent in the 20th century because salt is the only other way to preserve food.

Using salt, an entire fish can be reduced down to just this.

While it may not look appetizing, this allowed people to store fish they caught instead of eating it immediately.

Much of this salt was found in the Dead Sea.

• What role did the Mediterranean Sea have in the formation of the Dead Sea?
• Why might this area have been valuable to growing civilizations?

Watch the next video for the answers.

This lake has provided a constant salt supply since Greek and Roman times.

For centuries, the salt trade was the primary economic activity in this region and is a major reason Greeks and Romans alike eventually sought to control the entire supply.

Modern Times

While salt has been one of the few large-scale resources from this area for centuries, natural gas - the fuel of the modern world - has been discovered in huge quantities. Just as salt brought food supply stability to growing civilizations in this area, the discovery of natural gas brought a more stable power supply.

Natural gas is a fossil fuel that releases 50% to 60% less emissions when burned in a power plant than other fossil fuels such as coal. Knowing this, it is much easier for companies to sell natural gas as a better alternative to oil and coal.

Continue to the Got It? section to learn what the Mediterranean Sea had to do with the creation of this fuel of the future.