The Zanclean flood or Zanclean Deluge is a flood theorized to have refilled the Mediterranean Sea 5.33 million years ago. This flooding ended the Messinian salinity crisis and marks the beginning of the Zanclean age. The term was coined by Maria Bianca Cita in 1972 during the Deep Sea Drilling Project study that investigated the transition between the Messinian and Zanclean ages in the Mediterranean.[2]