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Why do matching fossils on separate continents support the existence of Pangea?

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Permian paleogeography — Pangea Distribution of landmasses, mountainous regions, shallow seas, and deep ocean basins near the end of the Permian Period. Included in the paleogeographic reconstruction are the locations of the interval's subduction zones.

Matching fossils on separate continents provide compelling evidence for the existence of Pangea because they indicate that these landmasses were once physically connected.12

When Alfred Wegener first proposed the theory of continental drift, he noted that identical fossils of certain plants and animals were found on continents now separated by vast oceans, such as South America and Africa. Because these organisms would have been unable to traverse the wide, deep waters of the modern Atlantic Ocean, their presence on both sides suggests that the continents were joined as a single landmass at the time these species lived.13

This paleontological evidence is supported by geological findings, such as matching rock formations and mountain ranges across continents, which further confirm that these landmasses were once part of a unified supercontinent. These observations were later integrated into the modern theory of plate tectonics, which explains how these continents moved apart over millions of years.4125