title: Continental drift before 1900.
abstract: The idea that Francis Bacon and other seventeenth and eighteenth century thinkers first conceived the notion of continental drift does not stand up to close scrutiny. The few authors who expressed the idea viewed the process as a catastrophic event.
authors.affiliation: Department of Geological and Geophysical Sciences, Princeton University, Princeton, New Jersey 08540, USA.
authors.forename: N A
authors.initials: NA
authors.lastname: Rupke