Archipolypoda

Archipolypoda is an extinct group of millipedes known from fossils in Europe and North America and containing the earliest known land animals. The Archipolypoda was erected by Scudder (1882) but redefined in 2005 with the description of several new species from Scotland. Distinguishing characteristics include relatively large eyes with densely packed ocelli, and modified leg pairs on the 8th body ring. Some species had prominent spines while others had a flattened appearance.

Archipolypoda

John Sterling Kingsley · Public Domain · via Wikipedia/Commons. 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
HelminthomorphaPBDB
Motility
actively mobilePBDB, for Arthropoda

Time the record covers

At least 116 million years on record.

The record covers at least 426.7 Mya to 309.8 Mya. No occurrence read is dated outside 432.9 Mya to 307 Mya.

Silurian — about 9 of 105 occurrencesSilurianDevonian — about 12 of 105 occurrencesDevonianCarboniferous — about 84 of 105 occurrencesCarboniferous435–431 Mya — about 0.9 occurrences431–427 Mya — about 7 occurrences427–422 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences422–418 Mya — about 3 occurrences418–414 Mya — about 6 occurrences414–409 Mya — about 1 occurrence409–405 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences405–401 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences401–396 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences396–392 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences383–379 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences379–374 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences374–370 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences366–361 Mya — about 0.6 occurrences361–357 Mya — about 1 occurrence357–352 Mya — about 2 occurrences352–348 Mya — about 2 occurrences348–344 Mya — about 0.7 occurrences339–335 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences335–331 Mya — about 0.8 occurrences331–326 Mya — about 0.6 occurrences326–322 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences322–318 Mya — about 4 occurrences318–313 Mya — about 14 occurrences313–309 Mya — about 27 occurrences309–304 Mya — about 31 occurrences426.7 Mya309.8 Mya435 Mya304 Mya

105 occurrences of Archipolypoda on record, most of them in the Carboniferous. 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

105 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

13 formations

Carbondale — 41.34°N, 88.39°WCarbondale — 41.29°N, 88.19°WKladno — 49.71°N, 13.21°ECowie — 56.95°N, 2.20°WDundee Flagstone — 56.67°N, 2.77°WDundee Flagstone — 56.48°N, 3.12°WDundee Flagstone — 56.57°N, 2.73°WDundee Flagstone — 56.77°N, 2.48°WBallagan — 55.84°N, 2.07°WBallagan — 55.79°N, 2.21°WPennant — 51.71°N, 3.91°WDundee — 56.67°N, 2.79°WDundee — 56.77°N, 2.48°WDownton Castle Sandstone — 51.37°N, 2.73°WCatskill — 41.34°N, 77.68°WEscuminac — 48.11°N, 66.37°WBerthelsdorf — 51.12°N, 12.50°EWalbrzych — 50.78°N, 16.26°ESaarbrucken’schen Kohlengebirges — 49.26°N, 7.00°E

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The named rock units Archipolypoda has been recovered from, largest first. Drawn where the rock is now, not where it formed. 17 occurrences have no formation on record, which is common for older literature.

Archipolypoda and its relatives

Carboniferous

Where Archipolypoda and its relatives were recorded in the Carboniferous.

Found in the same rock

360 taxa

The Paleobiology Database records 51 sites for Archipolypoda, 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

27 references

Each of the 105 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. 15 further references are not listed. 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 Archipolypoda

Credit
John Sterling Kingsley
Licence
Public Domain
Commercial use
the licence allows it

No 3D scan of Archipolypoda was found in MorphoSource and Sketchfab.

Smithsonian Open Access was 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 itHelminthomorpha through timeFormations of the CarboniferousThe world it lived on

Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0. (Scudder 1882)