The youngest of the five geological epochs of the Tertiary Period. The Pliocene represents the interval of geological time (and rocks deposited during that time) extending from the end of the Miocene Epoch to the beginning of the Pleistocene Epoch of the Quaternary Period. Modern time scales assign the duration of 5.0 million to 1.8 million years ago to the Pliocene. It marked the modern formation of the continents.
Related terms: