Archipelago: A Group of Closely Scattered Islands in A Large Body of Water

A group of closely scattered islands in a large body of water are called an archipelago; sometimes also called an island group or island chain. It is a cluster of islands, the name for which derives from the Greek words for ‘chief’ and ‘sea’. The Italian tradition of antiquity, known as the Archipelago, was the name for the Aegean Sea, which was notable for its large number of islands; owing to the origin of the name used for a group of scattered islands in a sea, now.

Archipelagos are not necessarily found only in large bodies of water, but also in bodies of water neighboring land mass. An example of this is Scotland, the main lands of which are surrounded by islands that are more than 700 in number; this qualifies as an archipelago. As archipelagos are often volcanic, this means that they often form long island arcs which are generated by hotspots, but can also be an outcome of factors like erosion, deposition, and land elevation. What it really means is simple a vast area of water which contains a number of islands. Geologically, islands that form an achipelago can be called oceanic islands, continental fragments, and continental islands. Examples of countries that are mostly archipelagos are: Indonesia, Japan, Philippines, New Zealand, and the United Kingdom; the largest one of these is Indonesia.

Archipelago