A new technique for estimating minimum absolute velocities of plates or continents from their apparent polar wander paths is applied to North America, Eurasia, and Gondwanaland for the past 350 m.y. For brief periods of time (approximately 30 m.y. long) each of these continents has moved at minimum velocities much greater than the present velocities of plates with large continents and comparable to the present velocities of the oceanic plates. We conclude from this that the resistance to plate motion of continental plates is not necessarily greater than that of oceanic plates and that the present low values of continental velocities are an accident of present plate geometry.