Fossils
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Glasgow Museums has a collection of about 50,000 fossils. These date broadly from 542 million years ago at the beginning of the Cambrian Period to 12,000 years ago in the Quaternary Period. This collection predominantly comprises specimens from Scotland, particularly the west of Scotland. The remainder are from elsewhere in Britain and there are small numbers from other parts of the world. Notably, the collection includes 650 type, figured and cited specimens. Invertebrates dominate the collection and those of the Carboniferous Period form the largest and most important part, with nearly all of the major invertebrate groups represented. Significant within the collection is Quaternary material, which includes mainly gastropod and bivalve molluscs and microfossils from the Late Glacial marine clays of the Glasgow and Firth of Clyde area. There are also large collections of arthropods from the Silurian Period, from the Lesmahagow area in Lanarkshire, and Ordovician and Silurian graptolites from the Southern Uplands. The vertebrate fossil collection mainly comprises fish specimens, the majority of which are from the Devonian and Carboniferous Periods, with some early agnathans – or jawless fish – of the Silurian Period, from Lesmahagow. There are also small numbers of amphibians, reptiles and mammals. The fossil plants are mainly from Scotland and from the Carboniferous Period, and include lycopods, sphenopsids and ferns and fern-like plants.
- Broader term
- Narrower term
Amphibian, Reptile and Bird Fossils