The Cambrian Period

The Cambrian Period—the first period of the Paleozoic Era, began approximately 570 million years ago, and lasted for 65 million years. It is separated into three epochs:
the Early Cambrian (570 to 540 mya), the Middle Cambrian (540 to 523 mya), and the Late Cambrian (523 to 505 mya). Geologist Adam Sedgewick named it in 1835, after a region in North Wales where he found the first rocks of this time period. During this time period, the world went through major changes. During the Early Cambrian Period, all the continents that formed the super-continent Pannotia
drifted apart forming new continents. The multiple collisions of the earth’s plates gave rise to a new supercontinet called Gondwane that contained of what is now China, India, Australia, Antarctica, Africa and South America. Baltica contained parts of Scandinavia and Eastern Europe, and Laurentania contained the largest part of North America. During this time period, the continents and seas differed from present d...