Ancistrocrania

Ancistrocrania is an extinct genus of brachiopods from the Upper Cretaceous of Europe and North-America. The name is derived from the Greek words αγκιστρο (agkistro) "fish hook" and κρανίον (kranion) skull.

Ancistrocrania

via iDigBio · CC BY · via iDigBio. May be a photograph of a specimen, or an artist’s reconstruction — an interpretation of a skeleton, since colour and soft tissue are almost never preserved.

On record

Recorded, not inferred
Sits inside
CraniidaePBDB
Diet
suspension feederPBDB, for Craniida
Life habit
epifaunalPBDB, for Craniida
Motility
stationaryPBDB, for Craniida
Vision
blindPBDB, for Craniata
Environment
marinePBDB, for Craniata

Time the record covers

At least 84 million years on record.

The record covers at least 89.8 Mya to 5.333 Mya. No occurrence read is dated outside 93.9 Mya to 3.6 Mya.

Late Cretaceous — about 12 of 20 occurrencesLate CretaceousPaleocene — about 0 of 20 occurrencesEocene — about 0 of 20 occurrencesOligocene — about 0 of 20 occurrencesMiocene — about 6 of 20 occurrencesMiocenePliocene — about 2 of 20 occurrencesPleistocene — about 0 of 20 occurrences96–93 Mya — about 2 occurrences93–89 Mya — about 4 occurrences86–83 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences83–80 Mya — about 1 occurrence80–77 Mya — about 1 occurrence77–74 Mya — about 1 occurrence74–71 Mya — about 1 occurrence71–68 Mya — about 1 occurrence68–64 Mya — about 0.5 occurrences14–11 Mya — about 6 occurrences8.1–4.9 Mya — about 0.5 occurrences4.9–1.8 Mya — about 2 occurrences89.8 Mya5.333 Mya96 Mya2 Mya

20 occurrences of Ancistrocrania on record, most of them in the Late Cretaceous. Bar height is expected occurrences, not a count: each fossil is spread across the span it is dated to, so a tall narrow bar means tight dating and a low wide one means loose.

When

20 occurrences

These are dates about fossils, not the animal: the record can only begin after it arose and end before it died out, so either end may reach further. Shares are expected occurrences: a fossil dated to a span is counted partly in each period it straddles. More on what this infers.

Found in

2 formations

Bilá — 49.98°N, 15.60°EMaastricht — 50.80°N, 5.68°E

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The named rock units Ancistrocrania has been recovered from, largest first. Drawn where the rock is now, not where it formed. 16 occurrences have no formation on record, which is common for older literature.

Ancistrocrania and its relatives

Late Cretaceous

Where Ancistrocrania and its relatives were recorded in the Late Cretaceous.

Found in the same rock

168 taxa

The Paleobiology Database records 16 sites for Ancistrocrania, and this reads all of them. The number is how many of those sites it was catalogued from too. The 24 sharing the most are listed.

This is not a list of everything alive at the time. It is only what has come out of the same ground as this animal and been written down.

Entered from

8 references

Each of the 20 occurrences read was entered from one of these publications, ordered by how many each accounts for. This is not a search for papers mentioning the name. Entries link to doi.org where the Paleobiology Database holds an identifier, and to its own record where it does not. Relayed as the Paleobiology Database holds them, not checked against what they resolve to.

Media and terms

Media content1

Picture of Ancistrocrania

Source
iDigBio
Credit
via iDigBio
Licence
CC BY
Commercial use
the licence allows it

No 3D scan of Ancistrocrania was found in Sketchfab.

Smithsonian Open Access and MorphoSource were not reached for this taxon, so this list is what the others held rather than everything there is.

The description on this site

Licence
CC BY-SA 4.0

This is what the site found, which is not the same as what exists.

Keep going

What may have been alongside itCraniidae through timeFormations of the Late CretaceousThe world it lived on

Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0. Dall 1877