Bodies of Water Bordering Africa

Nov 15, 2025 0

Africa, the world's second-largest continent both in size and population, is surrounded by several significant bodies of water that have profoundly shaped its history, climate, and ecosystems.

The continent of Africa borders the southern half of the Mediterranean Sea to the north, the Atlantic Ocean to the west, and the Indian Ocean to the southeast. Africa stretches well south of the equator to cover more than 12 million square miles.

These bodies of water have not only served as crucial trade routes and sources of sustenance but have also influenced the development of civilizations and the distribution of natural resources.

The Mediterranean Sea

The Mediterranean Sea is an intercontinental sea situated between Europe, Asia, and Africa. It is surrounded by the Mediterranean basin and almost completely enclosed by land: on the east by the Levant in West Asia, on the north by Anatolia in West Asia and Southern Europe, and on the south by North Africa.

The Mediterranean Sea ( MED-ih-tə-RAY-nee-ən) covers an area of about 2,500,000 km2 (970,000 sq mi), representing 0.7% of the global ocean surface; it includes fifteen marginal seas, including the Aegean, Adriatic, Tyrrhenian, and Marmara. The history of the Mediterranean region is crucial to understanding the origins and development of many modern societies; it is sometimes described as an "incubator of Western civilization" and saw the emergence of some of the earliest and most advanced civilisations, including those of Egypt, Greece, and the Fertile Crescent.

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The Levant in the Eastern Mediterranean was among the first regions in the world to display permanent human habitation as early as 12,000 BC. The Mediterranean Sea was an important route for merchants, travellers, and migrants in antiquity, facilitating trade and cultural exchange between various peoples as well as colonisation and conquest.

The Mediterranean Sea has an average depth of 1,500 m (4,900 ft) and the deepest recorded point is 5,109 ± 1 m (16,762 ± 3 ft) in the Calypso Deep in the Ionian Sea. It lies 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 Alexandretta, on the southeastern coast of Turkey, is about 4,000 kilometres (2,500 mi). The north-south length varies greatly between different shorelines and whether only straight routes are considered.

Also including longitudinal changes, the shortest shipping route between the multinational Gulf of Trieste and the Libyan coastline of the Gulf of Sidra is about 1,900 kilometres (1,200 mi). The water temperatures are mild in winter and warm in summer and give name to the Mediterranean climate type due to the majority of precipitation falling in the cooler months.

The countries surrounding the Mediterranean and its marginal seas in clockwise order are Spain, France, Monaco, Italy, Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Montenegro, Albania, Greece, Turkey, Syria, Lebanon, Israel, Palestine (Gaza Strip), Egypt, Libya, Tunisia, Algeria, and Morocco; Cyprus and Malta are island countries in the sea.

In addition, Northern Cyprus (de facto state) and two overseas territories of the United Kingdom (Akrotiri and Dhekelia, and Gibraltar) also have coastlines along the Mediterranean Sea. The drainage basin encompasses a large number of other countries, the Nile being the longest river ending in the Mediterranean Sea.

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The Mediterranean Sea encompasses a vast number of islands, some of them of volcanic origin. Romans called the Mediterranean Mare Magnum ("Great Sea") or Mare Internum ("Internal Sea") and, starting with the Roman Empire, Mare Nostrum ("Our Sea").

The term Mare Mediterrāneum appears later: Solinus apparently used this in the 3rd century, but the earliest extant witness to it is in the 6th century,[5] in Isidore of Seville.[6][7] It means 'in the middle of land, inland' in Latin, a compound of medius ('middle'), terra ('land, earth'), and -āneus ('having the nature of').[citation needed] The Latin word is a calque of Greek μεσόγειος (mesógeios; 'inland'), from μέσος (mésos, 'in the middle') and γήινος (gḗinos, 'of the earth'), from γῆ (gê, 'land, earth').

In Modern Arabic, it is known as al-Baḥr [al-Abyaḍ] al-Mutawassiṭ (البحر [الأبيض] المتوسط) 'the [White] Middle Sea'. In Islamic and older Arabic literature, it was Baḥr al-Rūm(ī) (بحر الروم or بحر الرومي) 'the Sea of the Romans' or 'the Roman Sea'. At first, that name referred to only the Eastern Mediterranean, but it was later extended to the whole Mediterranean.

The Ancient Egyptians called the Mediterranean Wadj-wr/Wadj-Wer/Wadj-Ur. The Carthaginians called it the "Syrian Sea". In ancient Syriac texts, Phoenician epics and in the Hebrew Bible, it was primarily known as the "Great Sea", הים הגדול, HaYam HaGadol, (Numbers; Book of Joshua; Ezekiel) or simply as "The Sea" (1 Kings). However, it has also been called the "Hinder Sea" because of its location on the west coast of the region of Syria or the Holy Land (and therefore behind a person facing the east), which is sometimes translated as "Western Sea". Another name was the "Sea of the Philistines", (Book of Exodus).

The Ancient Greeks called the Mediterranean simply ἡ θάλασσα (hē thálassa; 'the Sea') or sometimes ἡ μεγάλη θάλασσα (hē megálē thálassa; 'the Great Sea'), ἡ ἡμετέρα θάλασσα (hē hēmetérā thálassa; 'Our Sea'), or ἡ θάλασσα ἡ καθ'ἡμᾶς (hē thálassa hē kath’hēmâs; 'the sea around us').[citation needed] According to Johann Knobloch, in classical antiquity, cultures in the Levant used colours to refer to the cardinal points: black referred to the north (explaining the name Black Sea), yellow or blue to east, red to south (e.g., the Red Sea), and white to west. This would explain the Greek Áspri Thálassa, the Bulgarian Byalo More, the Turkish Akdeniz, and the Arab nomenclature described above, lit.

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In Turkish, it is the Akdeniz 'the White Sea'; in Ottoman, ﺁق دكز, which sometimes means only the Aegean Sea.[18] The origin of the name is not clear, as it is not known in earlier Greek, Byzantine or Islamic sources. It may be to contrast with the Black Sea.[10][12][19] In Persian, the name was translated as Baḥr-i Safīd, which was also used in later Ottoman Turkish.

Major ancient civilisations were located around the Mediterranean. Darius I of Persia, who conquered Ancient Egypt, built a canal linking the Red Sea to the Nile, and thus the Mediterranean. A variety of foodstuffs, spices and crops were introduced to the western Mediterranean's Spain and Sicily during Arab rule, via the commercial networks of the Islamic world.

The Arab invasions disrupted the trade relations between Western and Eastern Europe while disrupting trade routes with Eastern Asian Empires. This, however, had the indirect effect of promoting trade across the Caspian Sea. The export of grains from Egypt was re-routed towards the Eastern world. Products from East Asian empires, like silk and spices, were carried from Egypt to ports like Venice and Constantinople by sailors and Jewish merchants.

The Viking raids further disrupted the trade in western Europe and brought it to a halt. However, the Norsemen developed the trade from Norway to the White Sea, while also trading in luxury goods from Spain and the Mediterranean. The Byzantines in the mid-8th century retook control of the area around the north-eastern part of the Mediterranean.

The Fatimids maintained trade relations with the Italian city-states like Amalfi and Genoa before the Crusades, according to the Cairo Geniza documents. A document dated 996 mentions Amalfian merchants living in Cairo. Another letter states that the Genoese had traded with Alexandria. The Crusades led to the flourishing of trade between Europe and the outremer region.[44] Genoa, Venice and Pisa created colonies in regions controlled by the Crusaders and came to control the trade with the Orient. These colonies also allowed them to trade with the Eastern world.

Ottoman power based in Anatolia continued to grow, and in 1453 extinguished the Byzantine Empire with the Conquest of Constantinople.[47] Hayreddin Barbarossa, the Ottoman captain is a symbol of this domination with the victory of the Battle of Preveza (1538), opening up Tripoli and the eastern Mediterranean to Ottoman rule.[48] As the naval prowess of the European powers increased, they confronted Ottoman expansion in the region when the Battle of Lepanto (1571) damaging the power of the Ottoman Navy.

The development of oceanic shipping began to affect the entire Mediterranean. The sea remained strategically important. British mastery of Gibraltar ensured their influence in Africa and Southwest Asia. With the opening of the lockless Suez Canal in 1869, the flow of trade between Europe and Asia changed fundamentally.

The fastest route now led through the Mediterranean towards East Africa and Asia. This led to a preference for the Mediterranean countries and their ports like Trieste with direct connections to Central and Eastern Europe experienced a rapid economic rise.

In 2013, the Maltese president described the Mediterranean Sea as a "cemetery" due to the large number of migrants who drowned there after their boats capsized.[59] European Parliament president Martin Schulz said in 2014 that Europe's migration policy "turned the Mediterranean into a graveyard", referring to the number of drowned refugees in the region as a direct result of the policies.[60] An Azerbaijani official described the sea as "a burial ground ... Following the 2013 Lampedusa migrant shipwreck, the Italian government decided to strengthen the national system for the patrolling of the Mediterranean Sea by authorising "Operation Mare Nostrum", a military and humanitarian mission in order to rescue the migrants and arrest the traffickers of immigrants. Italy was particularly affected by the European migrant crisis.

to the Atlantic Ocean by the Strait of Gibraltar (known as the "Pillars of Hercules") in the west. to the Sea of Marmara and the Black Sea, by the Straits of the Dardanelles and the Bosporus respectively, in the east. The 163 km (101 mi) long artificial Suez Canal in the southeast connects the Mediterranean Sea to the Red Sea without ship lock, because the water level is essentially the same.

Note 1: The International Hydrographic Organization defines the area as generic Mediterranean Sea, in the Western Basin. On the northeast: The west coast of Italy. In the Strait of Messina, a line joining the north extreme of Cape Paci (15°42′E) with Cape Peloro, the east extreme of the Island of Sicily.

Mediterranean Sea Characteristics

Here are some key characteristics of the Mediterranean Sea:

Characteristic	Value
Surface Area	2,500,000 km2 (970,000 sq mi)
Average Depth	1,500 m (4,900 ft)
Maximum Depth	5,109 m (16,762 ft)
Water Volume	3,750,000 km3 (900,000 cu mi)
Residence Time	80-100 years
Maximum Temperature	28 °C (82 °F)

The Atlantic Ocean

The Atlantic Ocean is the world’s second largest ocean and is situated in between the American Continents and the Western Coasts of Europe and Africa. It stretches in the north till its boundary with the Arctic Ocean and extends to the Southern Ocean in the South.

The Atlantic Ocean is usually divided into the North and South with the North Atlantic Ocean hosting the world’s busiest shipping routes. The Atlantic Ocean is also divided longitudinally into two parts by the Mid-Atlantic Ridge that runs down the middle of the Atlantic Ocean.

Major island chains located in the Atlantic Ocean include the Azores, the Canary, the Falkland, the Sandwich Islands and the nation of Cape Verde.

The Indian Ocean

The Indian Ocean is the third largest Ocean in the world and is located south of the Indian subcontinent, east of Africa while its eastern end stretches till the West coast of Tasmania and the South China Sea in its north-east.

In the west, it borders the South Atlantic Ocean, the South Pacific Ocean in the east and the Southern Ocean to the south. The western half of the Indian Ocean is prone to the formation of many cyclones. Major islands in the Indian Ocean include Madagascar, Mauritius and Christmas Island. Island chains in the Indian Ocean include the Cocos Island and the Chagos Archipelago where the island of Diego Garcia is situated.

To the east of Africa is the Indian Ocean, to the west the Atlantic Ocean. Together, these two vast bodies of water cover around 50% of the surface of our planet. They meet in one place only, a bit south of the coast of South Africa.

In the west of the Indian Ocean, from Madagascar and south along the coast of Africa, flows warm and salty water. The current has been named the Agulhas and is only about 30 kilometers wide, but is one of the strongest ocean currents in the world.

The Agulhas Current carries 70 million cubic meters of water per second, twice as much water as the Gulf Stream. The current does not flow in a straight line along the coast, there are lots of bends. Some of these bends "break off" from the current and end up as eddies in the sea. The Agulhas Current stays close to the coast until it approaches the southern tip of Africa. There it "lets go" and continues out to sea.

A couple of times a year these eddies become so large that they have been given their own name, Natal pulses.

In the South Atlantic, between South America and Africa, there is a huge eddy. The water flows westward south of the equator, then south along South America, and eastward towards Africa. When the current meets the African coast, cold water is forced up from the depths. A bit off the coast furthest south in Africa this cold water meets the warm Agulhas Current, with water five degrees warmer.

The clash between cold and warm water is dramatic. Huge eddies are formed, both on the surface and down in the depths. In the eddies, 20-25% of the warm and salty water from the Indian Ocean mixes with the cold Atlantic water, and flows northward along the west coast of Africa. This current is called the Benguela, and some of this water eventually ends up in the Gulf Stream.

What is left of the Agulhas Current loses out to the cold Atlantic current and the wind that constantly blows from the west, and is forced back towards the east. Some of this water flows northward and back into the Indian Ocean, some becomes part of the ocean current that circulates around Antarctica.

Abundant marine life appears, when strong ocean currents meet like this, upwelling brings nutrient-rich deep-ocean water to the surface. Up there in the sunlight, there are good conditions for phytoplankton, which in turn become food for zooplankton, fish, and other animals.

The eddies are so large that the heat they transfer to the air above affects the wind pattern, cloud formation and precipitation in the southern Indian Ocean. The scientists on board are also looking into the effect of this in a warming world.

It has been shown that the Agulhas Current has changed due to climate change, and that these changes in dynamics, speed etc has had an impact on the biology. Understanding this process is important.

The sensors in satellites are able to capture what is happening in the ocean off the coast of southern Africa. In the satellite images the Agulhas Current can be seen as a ribbon of warm water, and the eddies and Natal pulses as dark spots on the sea surface. It is also possible to see how the cold Benguela Current flows along the west coast of Africa.

It's surprising to see how the models we’ve seen in class and the assumptions we have on depth and temperature and so on are not true. We’re trying to understand the difference between reality and what we’re being taught.

Seeing the waves is something else than satellites. It helps me to understand more, giving more clarity. I think if I were to write a paper about waves now it would be much more clear.

Agulhas Current

Rivers and Lakes of Africa

Africa is also home to many significant rivers and lakes:

Nile River: Usually cited as the longest river in the world, the Nile flows about 4,132 miles in a generally south-to-north direction from its headwaters in Burundi to Egypt’s Mediterranean Sea coast, where it forms a prototypical delta.
Congo River: Africa’s second-longest river, it flows in a counterclockwise arc some 2,900 miles to the Atlantic Ocean.
Zambezi River: Weaving across southern Africa, the Zambezi rises in eastern Angola, passes through Zambia, flows along the borders of Namibia, Botswana, and Zimbabwe, crosses through Mozambique, and enters the Indian Ocean’s Mozambique Channel near Chinde.
Niger River: Africa’s third-longest, it flows in a great clockwise arc through Guinea, Mali, Niger, and Nigeria before entering the Gulf of Guinea.
Limpopo River: Rising as the Crocodile (or Krokodil) River in South Africa’s Witwatersrand region, it forms the Transvaal’s border with Botswana and Zimbabwe, then crosses through Mozambique.
Okavango River: The Okavango flows for about 1,000 miles from central Angola, through Namibia’s Caprivi Strip, and into the Kalahari Desert of Botswana.
Lake Victoria: Africa’s largest and the world’s second-largest freshwater lake by area, Lake Victoria lies along the Equator and is shared among Uganda, Kenya, and Tanzania.
Lake Tanganyika: Africa’s second-largest lake by area, it is also the second-deepest in the world, surpassed only by Lake Baikal.
Lake Malawi (or Lake Nyasa): Africa’s third-largest lake by area and the southernmost of the Great Rift Valley lakes, it is wedged between the nations of Malawi, Tanzania, and Mozambique.
Lake Volta: The largest man-made lake (by area) in the world, Lake Volta was created by the construction of Ghana’s Akosombo Dam across the Volta River in the 1960s.
Lake Chad: Formerly Africa’s fourth-largest lake, its surface area has been reduced by over 90% since the 1960s due to droughts and diversion of water from such sources as the Chari River.