The Ends of the Earth, one twelfth…
23374 BCE to 21646 BCE
The Ends of the Earth, one twelfth of the Earth’s surface, is bordered by the South Atlantic and South Pacific Oceans and includes Subcontinental South America, the Chonos Archipelago, Chiloé Island, Tierra del Fuego, the Falkland Islands, the remote Juan Fernández Islands (notably home to the marooned sailor Alexander Selkirk from 1704 to 1709, an experience thought to have inspired Daniel Defoe’s Robinson Crusoe), the even more remote Easter Island, and West Antarctica—the portion of Antarctica that lies within the Western Hemisphere and includes the Antarctic Peninsula.
Easter Island, culturally Polynesian yet governed by Chile, is among the most isolated inhabited islands in the world, positioned in the eastern South Pacific Ocean at the northwestern edge of The Ends of the Earth, along with the equally remote Pitcairn Islands.
The southeastern and southwestern boundaries divide West Antarctica from the much larger East Antarctica.
The northeastern boundary follows the approximate courses of the Colorado and Barrancas Rivers, which flow from the Andes to the Atlantic Ocean and are traditionally recognized as the northern limit of Argentine Patagonia.
For Chilean Patagonia, most geographers and historians identify its northern boundary at the Huincul Fault in the Araucanía Region.
HistoryAtlas contains 153 entries for The Ends of the Earths from the Upper Paleolithic period to 1899.
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