Wiktionary
n. In oceanography, a mostly enclosed sea that has limited exchange of deep water with outer oceans and where the water circulation is dominated by salinity and temperature differences rather than winds.
Wikipedia
The Mediterranean Sea (pronounced ) is a sea connected to the Atlantic Ocean surrounded by the Mediterranean Basin and almost completely enclosed by land: on the north by Southern Europe and Anatolia, on the south by North Africa, and on the east by the Levant. The sea is sometimes considered a part of the Atlantic Ocean, although it is usually identified as a separate body of water.
The name Mediterranean is derived from the Latin mediterraneus, meaning "inland" or "in the middle of land" (from medius, "middle" and terra, "land"). It covers an approximate area of 2.5 million km (965,000 sq mi), but its connection to the Atlantic (the Strait of Gibraltar) is only wide. The Strait of Gibraltar is a narrow strait that connects the Atlantic Ocean to the Mediterranean Sea and separates Gibraltar and Spain in Europe from Morocco in Africa. In oceanography, it is sometimes called the Eurafrican Mediterranean Sea or the European Mediterranean Sea to distinguish it from mediterranean seas elsewhere.
The Mediterranean Sea has an average depth of and the deepest recorded point is in the Calypso Deep in the Ionian Sea. The sea is bordered on the north by Europe, the east by Asia, and in the south by Africa. It is located between latitudes 30° and 46° N and longitudes 6° W and 36° E. Its west-east length, from the Strait of Gibraltar to the Gulf of Iskenderun, on the southwestern coast of Turkey, is approximately 4,000 km (2,500 miles). The sea's average north-south length, from Croatia’s southern shore to Libya, is approximately 800 km (500 miles). The Mediterranean Sea, including the Sea of Marmara (connected by the Dardanelles to the Aegean Sea), has a surface area of approximately 2,510,000 square km (970,000 square miles).
The sea was an important route for merchants and travelers of ancient times that allowed for trade and cultural exchange between emergent peoples of the region. The history of the Mediterranean region is crucial to understanding the origins and development of many modern societies.
The countries with coastlines on the Mediterranean Sea are Albania, Algeria, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Croatia, Cyprus, Egypt, France, Greece, Israel, Italy, Lebanon, Libya, Malta, Morocco, Monaco, Montenegro, Slovenia, Spain, Syria, Tunisia and Turkey. In addition, Palestine's Gaza Strip and the British Overseas Territories of Gibraltar and Akrotiri and Dhekelia have coastlines on the sea.
A mediterranean sea is, in oceanography, a mostly enclosed sea that has limited exchange of water with outer oceans and with water circulation dominated by salinity and temperature differences rather than winds. The similarly-named Mediterranean Sea, which is almost completely enclosed by Europe, Asia, and Africa, is an example.
Usage examples of "mediterranean sea".
Theresa Spinelli was a tiny, slim woman with steel-gray hair ruthlessly waved, a face that fell into dozens of comfortable wrinkles, and a smile as wide as the Mediterranean Sea.
He therefore was not a Frenchman, but an Italian whose native island (an old Greek, Carthaginian and Roman colony in the Mediterranean Sea) had for years been struggling to regain its independence, first of all from the Genoese, and after the middle of the eighteenth century from the French, who had kindly offered to help the Corsicans in their struggle for freedom and had then occupied the island for their own benefit.
The Nile River, having flowed into a vast fertile valley and then on toward the great ocean to the west, now ended at what had suddenly become the Mediterranean Sea.
It is located just north of the Pyrenees at their eastern edge adjacent to the Mediterranean Sea.
The young plesiosaur's graceful neck snapped as it impacted into the foaming pother of the new Mediterranean Sea.
Historically, he had learned, Gibraltar had been reckoned as one of the Pillars of Hercules, the great rocks guarding the entrance to the Mediterranean Sea.
None of the garrulous sun-hatted vulgarity of the usual Greek Mediterranean sea-resort - the Turkish Army had put an end to all that, drawn up twelve miles to the north.