Barbus barbus
The common barbel is a species of freshwater fish belonging to the family Cyprinidae. It shares the common name 'barbel' with its many relatives in the genus Barbus, of which it is the type species. In Great Britain it is usually referred to simply as the barbel; similar names are used elsewhere in Europe, such as barbeau in France and flodbarb in Sweden. The name derives from the four whiskerlike structures located at the corners of the fish's mouth, which it uses to locate food.

Neil Phillips from uk · CC BY 2.0 · 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
- BarbusPBDB
- Diet
- omnivorePBDB, for Cypriniformes
- Life habit
- nektonicPBDB, for Cypriniformes
- Motility
- actively mobilePBDB, for Cypriniformes
- Environment
- freshwaterPBDB, for Cypriniformes
Time the record covers
At most 645 thousand years on record.
The one occurrence read is dated to somewhere between 774 ka and 129 ka, which is a dating window rather than a span.
1 occurrence of Barbus barbus on record, most of them in the Pleistocene. The Paleobiology Database records this as a living group, and the chart stops with its fossils rather than at the present. 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
1 occurrences- Pleistocene100%
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.
Barbus barbus and its relatives
PleistoceneWhere Barbus barbus and its relatives were recorded in the Pleistocene.
Found in the same rock
31 taxa- Abramis brama1 site
- Anguilla1 site
- Apodemus sylvaticus1 site
- Belgrandia1 site
- Bovidae1 site
- Cervidae1 site
- Crocuta crocuta1 site
- Cyprinus1 site
- Elephantidae1 site
- Emys orbicularis1 site
- Equus1 site
- Esox lucius1 site
- Leuciscus1 site
- Lota1 site
- Megaloceros1 site
- Microtus1 site
- Microtus arvalis1 site
- Microtus oeconomus1 site
- Mimomys1 site
- Myodes1 site
- Natrix natrix1 site
- Perca fluviatilis1 site
- Rana1 site
- Rutilus1 site
The Paleobiology Database records 1 site for Barbus barbus, 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
1 referenceEach of the 1 occurrence 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. Each entry links to the Paleobiology Database's own record for the work.
Media and terms
Media content3
Picture of Barbus barbus
- Source
- Wikipedia/Commons
- Credit
- Neil Phillips from uk
- Licence
- CC BY 2.0
- Commercial use
- the licence allows it
CT scan
- Source
- MorphoSource
- Credit
- AUM Fish Collection
- Licence
- In Copyright
- Commercial use
- cannot be read from the licence given — check the record
- Specimen
- Barbus barbus · AUM:AUM:32176
3D model
- Source
- Sketchfab
- Licence
- CC0 Public Domain
- Commercial use
- the licence allows it
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 itBarbus through timeFormations of the PleistoceneThe world it lived on
Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0. (Linnaeus 1758)