Description
Fossilised trilobite, Huntonia lingulifer, Lower Devonian (400-385 Million years ago), Haragan Formation, Oklahoma USA. Piece 4cm x 4cm x 1.2cm, Trilobite approximately 2cm in length.
Trilobites are a group of extinct marine arthropods who inhabited our oceans from the Cambrian Period till the Permian Period (around 520-250 million years ago). They were a very successful class for over 270 million years and there is believed to be over 20,000 different species of trilobites.
The word trilobite means three lobes, referring to their segmented body consisting of head (cephalon,) abdomen (thorax), and tail (pygidium).
Like present day arthropods (insects) they had a hard exoskeleton which would act as defensive armour, but to grow they would have to moult to remove their restrictive exoskeleton then make another one with room to grow into. Their exoskeleton allowed for good preservation as fossils when they died. There is extensive fossil evidence of trilobites throughout the world, they can be an indicator of where ancient oceans once existed.
