Early Palaeozoic rifting from Gondwana and opening of Palaeo-Tethys ocean in the Early Devonian South China part of the India–Australian margin of Gondwana in the Early Palaeozoic rifted and separated from Gondwana by the opening of the Palaeo-Tethys ocean in the Early Devonian. Late Palaeozoic faunas and floras of these continental blocks are warm-water, equatorial Tethyan/Cathaysian Province biotas that contrast starkly with coeval cold-water and cold-climate Gondwana biotas Indochina part of the India–Australian margin of Gondwana in the Early Palaeozoic rifted and separated from Gondwana by the opening of the Palaeo-Tethys ocean in the Early Devonian. Late Palaeozoic faunas and floras of these continental blocks are warm-water, equatorial Tethyan/Cathaysian Province biotas that contrast starkly with coeval cold-water and cold-climate Gondwana biotas East Malaya part of the India–Australian margin of Gondwana in the Early Palaeozoic rifted and separated from Gondwana by the opening of the Palaeo-Tethys ocean in the Early Devonian. Late Palaeozoic faunas and floras of these continental blocks are warm-water, equatorial Tethyan/Cathaysian Province biotas that contrast starkly with coeval cold-water and cold-climate Gondwana biotas West Sumatra interpreted to have originally formed part of the terranes (which also included North China and Tarim) that separated from Gondwana in the Devonian Late Palaeozoic faunas and floras of these continental blocks are warm-water, equatorial Tethyan/Cathaysian Province biotas that contrast starkly with coeval cold-water and cold-climate Gondwana biotas West Burma interpreted to have originally formed part of the terranes (which also included North China and Tarim) that separated from Gondwana in the Devonian Late Palaeozoic faunas and floras of these continental blocks are warm-water, equatorial Tethyan/Cathaysian Province biotas that contrast starkly with coeval cold-water and cold-climate Gondwana biotas TheWest Burma block is bounded to thewest by a belt of ophiolites that includes theMount Victoriametamorphics and to the east by theMogok Metamorphic Belt that has recently been correlated with the Medial Sumatra Tectonic Zone The recent report of Middle Permian rocks from the West Burma block near Karmine with Cathaysian fusulinids similar to those of theWest Sumatra block suggest that theWest Burma blockmaywell have a Palaeozoic or older continental basement, and may have, together with the West Sumatra block, formed part of a Cathaysian terrane derived from the South China–Indochina–East Malaya composite terrane and later disrupted by the opening of the