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The Palaeontology Portal

Introduction

Paleontology (/ˌpeɪliɒnˈtɒlədʒi, ˌpæli-, -ən-/ PAY-lee-on-TOL-ə-jee, PAL-ee-, -⁠ən-), also spelled palaeontology or palæontology, is the scientific study of life that existed prior to the start of the Holocene epoch (roughly 11,700 years before present). It includes the study of fossils to classify organisms and study their interactions with each other and their environments (their paleoecology). Paleontological observations have been documented as far back as the 5th century BC. The science became established in the 18th century as a result of Georges Cuvier's work on comparative anatomy, and developed rapidly in the 19th century. The term has been used since 1822 formed from Greek παλαιός ('palaios', "old, ancient"), ὄν ('on', (gen. 'ontos'), "being, creature"), and λόγος ('logos', "speech, thought, study").

Paleontology lies on the border between biology and geology, but it differs from archaeology in that it excludes the study of anatomically modern humans. It now uses techniques drawn from a wide range of sciences, including biochemistry, mathematics, and engineering. Use of all these techniques has enabled paleontologists to discover much of the evolutionary history of life, almost back to when Earth became capable of supporting life, nearly 4 billion years ago. As knowledge has increased, paleontology has developed specialised sub-divisions, some of which focus on different types of fossil organisms while others study ecology and environmental history, such as ancient climates. (Full article...)

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Selected article on the prehistoric world and its legacies

Compsognathus (meaning 'elegant jaw') was a small, bipedal, carnivorous theropod dinosaur. The animal was the size of a chicken and lived around 150 million years ago, during the early Tithonian stage of the late Jurassic Period, in what is now Europe. Paleontologists have found two well-preserved fossils, one in Germany in the 1850s and the second in France more than a century later. Compsognathus is one of the few dinosaurs for which the diet is known with certainty: the remains of small, agile lizards are preserved in the bellies of both specimens. Teeth discovered in Portugal may be further fossil remains of the genus.

Although not recognized as such at the time of its discovery, Compsognathus is the first dinosaur known from a reasonably complete skeleton. Today, C. longipes is the only recognized species, although the larger specimen discovered in France in the 1970s was once thought to belong to a separate species, C. corallestris. Until the 1980s and 1990s, Compsognathus was the smallest known dinosaur and the closest supposed relative of the early bird Archaeopteryx. Thus, the genus is one of the few dinosaur genera to be well known outside of paleontological circles. (see more...)

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Did you know?

... that the extinct ant Anochetus lucidus is named for its shiny exoskeleton?
... that the recently described extinct penguin Inkayacu from the Eocene of Peru is postulated to have had gray and reddish brown feathers, unlike the black and white feathers of living penguins?
... that Ocepeia (pictured), a 60-million-year-old afrotherian mammal, is named after a Moroccan mining company?
...that although related to modern filter feeding baleen whales, the recently discovered prehistoric whale Janjucetus had large serrated teeth implying that it fed on large fish or even sharks?
... that seeds of the extinct tree Eucommia montana are found from British Columbia to Colorado?

... that paleontologists have discovered the fossilized eggs of cephalopods, fishes, and reptiles, with some dinosaur eggs (pictured) being preserved with pathological shell deformities?
... that Electrinocellia peculiaris is named for the Latin "electrum" meaning amber, "Inocellia", the type genus for Inocelliidae, and "peculiaris" for the enigmatic nature of the species?
... that Adolf Carl Noé challenged disbelief in the possibility of North American coal balls (example pictured) by presenting a wheelbarrow full of them?
... that the extinct New Zealand Musk Duck was becoming more sedentary than its closest relative, the Australian Musk Duck?
... that the Cretaceous Malagasy mammal Lavanify is most closely related to a species from India?

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General images - load new batch

The following are images from various paleontology-related articles on Wikipedia.

Image 1A Spriggina fossil from the Ediacaran (from History of paleontology)
Image 2Photograph of the second Archaeopteryx skeleton to be found, taken in 1881 at the Natural History Museum, Berlin (from History of paleontology)
Image 3Johann Jakob Scheuchzer tried to explain fossils using Biblical floods in his Herbarium of the Deluge (1709). (from History of paleontology)
Image 4Fossil of the Taung child discovered in South Africa in 1924 (from History of paleontology)
Image 5Illustration of the fossil jaw of the Stonesfield mammal from Gideon Mantell's 1848 Wonders of Geology (from History of paleontology)
Image 6Diagram by O.C. Marsh of the evolution of horse feet and teeth, reproduced in T. H. Huxley's 1876 book, Professor Huxley in America (from History of paleontology)
Image 7Illustration from Steno's 1667 paper shows a shark head and its teeth along with a fossil tooth for comparison. (from History of paleontology)
Image 8A complete Anomalocaris fossil from the Burgess shale (from History of paleontology)
Image 9Stephan Endlicher (from List of paleontologists)
Image 10Elmer Riggs and H.W. Menke in Field Columbian Museum's paleontology lab, 1899 (from History of paleontology)
Image 11Philippe-Charles Schmerling (from List of paleontologists)
Image 12Illustration of fossil Iguanodon teeth with a modern iguana jaw for comparison from Mantell's 1825 paper describing Iguanodon (from History of paleontology)
Image 13First mention of the word palæontologie, as coined in January 1822 by Henri Marie Ducrotay de Blainville in his Journal de physique (from History of paleontology)
Image 14Duria Antiquior – A more Ancient Dorset is a watercolor painted in 1830 by the geologist Henry De la Beche based on fossils found by Mary Anning. The late 18th and early 19th century was a time of rapid and dramatic changes in ideas about the history of life on earth. (from History of paleontology)
Image 15Geologic time scale from an 1861 book by Richard Owen shows the appearance of major animal types. (from History of paleontology)
Image 16A drawing comparing jaws was added in 1799 when Cuvier's 1796 presentation on living and fossil elephants was published. (from History of paleontology)
Image 17Illustration from William Smith's Strata by Organized Fossils (1817) (from History of paleontology)

Selected article on paleontology in human science, culture and economics

The history of paleontology traces the history of the effort to study the fossil record left behind by ancient life forms. Although fossils had been studied by scholars since ancient times, the nature of fossils and their relationship to life in the past became better understood during the 17th and 18th centuries. At the end of the 18th century the work of Georges Cuvier ended a long running debate about the reality of extinction and led to the emergence of paleontology as a scientific discipline.

The first half of the 19th century saw paleontological activity become increasingly well organized. This contributed to a rapid increase in knowledge about the history of life on Earth, and progress towards definition of the geologic time scale. As knowledge of life's history continued to improve, it became increasingly obvious that there had been some kind of successive order to the development of life. After Charles Darwin published Origin of Species in 1859, much of the focus of paleontology shifted to understanding evolutionary paths.

The last half of the 19th century saw a tremendous expansion in paleontological activity, especially in North America. The trend continued in the 20th century with additional regions of the Earth being opened to systematic fossil collection, as demonstrated by a series of important discoveries in China near the end of the 20th century. There was also a renewed interest in the Cambrian explosion that saw the development of the body plans of most animal phyla. (see more...)

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On this day...

September 18:

1857 - Florentino Ameghino was born in Luján, Argentina.
1943 - Charles E. Resser died in Washington, DC, USA.
1962 - Larry Kramer discovered a lower mastodon molar now catalogued as GRPM 12540 in Michigan, USA.
1982 - Pei Wenzhong died.

Forearm Posture and Mobility in Quadrupedal Dinosaurs

Collin S. VanBuren, Matthew Bonnan

published 18 Sep 2013

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Selected image

A diagram of the geological time scale, depicted as a spiral and exhibiting the life forms and environmental conditions characterizing its various divisions.
Image credit: Joseph Graham, William Newman, and John Stacy for the United States Geological Survey
Upload credit: Mwtoews