some geographers say eurasia is one continent, because europe and asia are mostly on the same tectonic plate and do not have a sea between them. the ancient greeks divided the world they knew into europe, asia and africa. to them, the aegean sea was the division between the balkan peninsula in europe and asia minor in asia. north of the sea of marmara, the greeks thought the lands on the western side of the black sea was europe and the eastern side was asia. the ancient greeks did not know very much about the lands north of the black sea. since classical antiquity, people have talked about asia and europe separately, so it is now a tradition to see them as two continents.