Juan Carlos Gutiérrez-Marco

This study investigates the apotropaic meaning of a fossil purchased in 1994 in a souk in Marrakesh, Morocco. The specimen is an internal mould of an infaunal Jurassic bivalve ( Pleuromya cf. uniformis [J. Sowerby]) bearing a religious inscription in high relief that has been identified as the Sunni formulation of the shahāda : ‘There is no god but Allāh, [and] Muḥammad is His Prophet’. This represents the first documented example of a religious talisman carved onto a fossil within Islamic culture. Unlike a previously known Cretaceous belemnite from Palestine bearing non-religious incised Arabic script, the present specimen displays a clearly devotional and protective intent. Contextual and documentary evidence suggests that the fossil functioned as a talisman intended to neutralize the magical powers attributed to fossils by certain Berber tribes, for whom marine fossils were used in witchcraft and divination and were believed to possess vital qualities. The inscription of the shahāda can be interpreted as an act of Islamization and resignification of fossils, affirming divine omnipotence and rejecting autonomous natural causality. The object was probably produced in the late nineteenth or early twentieth century, possibly in response to wider debates on evolution, using locally sourced Jurassic fossils from the Atlas Mountains.

During the Early Palaeozoic, echinoderms underwent a major diversification, establishing themselves as a fundamental component of benthic marine ecocystems (Lefebvre & Fatka, 2003; Sprinkle, 1992; ...

The fossil record of jaw-bearing polychaetes from South America is scarce, and only a few occurrences of Ordovician scolecodonts have been reported so far. Here, we document a monospecific jawed polychaete assemblage from the Darriwilian Lenodus crassus conodont zone of the San José Formation in the eastern Cordillera of Peru. The single species, Protarabellites luztejadae sp. nov., represents the oldest record of the family Ramphoprionidae worldwide and may point to the biogeographic origin of this group in Gondwana. The reconstructed jaw apparatus of P. luztejadae bears primitive characters such as the slightly enclosed myocoele, distinguishing it from the younger members of the family and providing insights into the evolutionary relationships with other labidognath families. The described assemblage is the first record of Ordovician scolecodonts from Peru, as well as from the northern part of the Central Andean Basin, and one of very few cases from where apparatus-based classification has been applied. However, the Palaeozoic scolecodonts in South America appear to be more common than generally thought. A review of poorly known regional literature shows that scolecodonts have been mentioned in various sites from Ordovician, Silurian, Devonian, and Carboniferous–Permian strata of Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Colombia, Peru, and Uruguay. This highlights the potential for future scolecodont studies in South America.

The Tafilalt Biota of southern Morocco has been shedding valuable light into the biodiversity and palaeoecology of the Upper Ordovician. The fossil remains of lightly-sclerotised discoidal organisms (eldonioids) are a common component among the Tafilalt assemblages preserved in sandstone. In this region, these non-biomineralised stem-group deuterostomes are widely distributed in the Upper Tiouririne Formation of eastern Tafilalt and in a relatively small area of northwestern Maïder, at the top of the First Bani Group. Within this stratigraphic range (Sa1–Ka3), the record is virtually restricted to a single species, Discophyllum peltatum Hall, which was locally described as ‘ Eldonia berbera ’ Alessandrello & Bracchi, a junior synonym. Although D. peltatum is the most abundant “soft-bodied” organism of the Tafilalt Biota, the Moroccan material has not yet been the subject of a modern taxonomic revision. An important study on the African fossils, which formed part of a PhD Thesis submitted in 2012 at the University of Galway (Ireland), remains unpublished. Therefore, we deemed it necessary to revisit this topic and consolidate the knowledge of the Tafilalt Biota in the present study, while formalising the proposal of certain suprageneric taxa (Order Eldonida, nov., and Family Paropsonemidae, nov.) underpinning the classification of eldonioids.

A pesar de que el Antropoceno sigue siendo entendido como un término esencial o primariamente geológico, lo cierto es que nunca ha tenido un carácter formal, habiendo fracasado en su intento de ingresar en la Tabla Cronoestratigráfica Internacional. La reciente candidatura establecía un inicio preciso en torno a 1950, un rango temporal excesivamente restrictivo aún para los usos informales del Antropoceno en otras disciplinas no geológicas, pertenecientes a las humanidades y ciencias sociales, ciencias ambientales y artes diversas. Estas utilidades, así como determinados contraconceptos opuestos al Antropoceno “oficial”, junto con la caracterización de un Evento Antropoceno con un renovado sentido geológico, dan buena medida de la Era Humana, y materializan el papel de la humanidad en el planeta.

Although the collection of fossils by humans is known from the Palaeolithic, the occurrence of trilobite remains in archaeological contexts is particularly rare worldwide, previously documented by specimens from sites in Western Europe, North America, South Africa and Australia. This article reports the discovery of an eleventh known trilobite found in an archaeological context, from a Roman settlement dating from the 1st–3rd centuries CE, excavated in north-western Spain (A Cibdá of Armea near the city of Ourense). The specimen represents the first confirmed trilobite from Roman times and is the third trilobite in the global archaeological record to have been collected and used by people over a thousand years ago. Its palaeontological and preservational characteristics enable us to pinpoint its probable origin to Middle Ordovician shale outcrops in south-central Iberia, over 430 km from the Roman excavation site where it was found. The modifications observed on the underside of the specimen, which exhibits up to seven artificial wear facets to flatten and shape the fossil, are interpreted as indicating its possible use within a pendant or bracelet, likely serving as an amulet with magical or protective properties.

David K. Loydell, Juan Carlos Gutiérrez-Marco, Petr Štorch, Jiří Frýda. Episodes -0001;0:. https://doi.org/10.18814/epiiugs/2025/025009

The Sirman Formation in the Svoge Unit is built of Hirnantian diamictites, a product of the Gondwana glaciation at the end of the Ordovician. One subangular lonestone of light gray sandstone of size of about 1 cm was found in the lower part of the formation. This pebble, interpreted as a glacial dropstone, contain a relatively well-preserved external negative mould of a trilobite pygidium, which has tentatively been identified as Dreyfussina cf. libyca in absence of cephalic characters. The nominal species was described from the Melaz Shuqran Formation of Libya (Al Qarqaf Arch). The present record supports an African origin for pebbles transported by floating ice to the sediments of the Svoge Unit, consistent with provenance data – the Trans-Saharan Belt, derived from the detrital zircons recorded on the same Hirnantian diamictites in Bulgaria.

En enero de 2024, la IUGS ratificaba la propuesta de la Comisión Internacional de Estratigrafía para designar un nuevo Estratotipo Global de Límite (GSSP) para la base del piso Telychiense (Sistema Silúrico). Éste reemplaza al GSSP establecido en 1985 en el área tipo de la Serie Llandovery al sur de Gales (Gran Bretaña), dados los problemas bioestratigráficos y de correlación detectados con posterioridad, entre ellos una mélange sedimentaria y discontinuidades en la sección. El grupo de trabajo creado en 2014 para estudiar un GSSP sustituto, consideró tres secciones candidatas situadas en Suecia, China y España, pero en 2019 la española quedó como candidata única y fue aprobada finalmente, en 2023, por la Subcomisión Internacional de Estratigrafía del Silúrico (ISSS) y la Comisión Internacional de Estratigrafía (ICS). La base del piso Telychiense viene definida por la primera aparición del graptolito cosmopolita Spirograptus guerichi dentro de una sucesión de pizarras negras graptolíticas, continua y sin hiatos, en un nuevo GSSP situado en la orilla norte del embalse de El Pintado, al oeste de Cazalla de la Sierra (Sevilla). El potencial de correlación bioestratigráfica y quimioestratigráfica con otras secciones mundiales fue debidamente acreditado y consta en una publicación detallada del año 2015.