You will most likely see lemurs in a Hollywood animation movie; singing, dancing and playing pranks. In the wild, they are found only on the island of Madagascar, which, to naturalists has always been a place of intriguing creatures.
Many life forms in Madagascar have affinities to lineages found in India (3,800 km away) rather than Africa (413 km). This posed a ‘difficult enigma’ to naturalists.
Zoologist Philip Sclater was perplexed by the presence of lemurs, their relatives, and their fossils in Madagascar and India, but not in nearby Africa or the Middle East. In the 1860s, he proposed that a large island or continent must have once existed between India and Madagascar, serving as a land bridge. Over time, this island had sunk. He called this proposed island Lemuria.
