Chamaeleonidae

Chameleons are a distinctive and highly specialized clade of Old World lizards with 200 species described as of June 2015. The members of this family are best known for their distinct range of colours, being capable of colour-shifting camouflage. The large number of species in the family exhibit considerable variability in their capacity to change colour. For some, it is more of a shift of brightness ; for others, a plethora of colour-combinations can be seen.

Chamaeleonidae

Rod Waddington · CC BY-SA 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
Also called
chameleonPBDB
Sits inside
AcrodontaPBDB
Motility
actively mobilePBDB, for Osteichthyes
Environment
terrestrialPBDB, for Amniota

Time the record covers

At least 16 million years on record.

The record covers at least 16.9 Mya to 11.7 ka. No occurrence read is dated outside 20.45 Mya to 0 Mya.

Miocene — about 32 of 38 occurrencesMiocenePliocene — about 2 of 38 occurrencesPliocenePleistocene — about 2 of 38 occurrencesPleistocene21–20 Mya — about 0.5 occurrences20–20 Mya — about 2 occurrences20–19 Mya — about 3 occurrences19–18 Mya — about 3 occurrences18–17 Mya — about 3 occurrences17–17 Mya — about 3 occurrences17–16 Mya — about 5 occurrences16–15 Mya — about 4 occurrences15–15 Mya — about 4 occurrences15–14 Mya — about 4 occurrences14–13 Mya — about 1 occurrence13–13 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences13–12 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences12–11 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences5.6–4.9 Mya — about 0.5 occurrences4.9–4.2 Mya — about 0.8 occurrences4.2–3.5 Mya — about 0.7 occurrences1.4–698 ka Mya — about 0.2 occurrences698 ka–0 Mya — about 4 occurrences16.9 Mya11.7 ka20.9 Mya0 Mya

38 occurrences of Chamaeleonidae on record, most of them in the Miocene. The Paleobiology Database records this as a living group. 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

38 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

9 formations

Ville — 50.90°N, 6.45°EUpper Freshwater Molasse — 48.44°N, 11.04°EUpper Freshwater Molasse — 48.63°N, 11.80°EUpper Freshwater Molasse — 48.16°N, 10.11°EBrackwater Molasse — 48.48°N, 10.10°EVarswater — 32.98°S, 18.15°EUpper Koru Series — 0.23°S, 35.34°EMost — 50.42°N, 13.36°ESoma — 38.62°N, 27.42°EDededağ — 38.53°N, 27.47°EHiwegi — 0.40°S, 34.17°E

Loading coastlines…

The named rock units Chamaeleonidae has been recovered from, largest first. Drawn where the rock is now, not where it formed. 20 occurrences have no formation on record, which is common for older literature.

Chamaeleonidae and its relatives

Miocene

Where Chamaeleonidae and its relatives were recorded in the Miocene.

Found in the same rock

689 taxa

The Paleobiology Database records 29 sites for Chamaeleonidae, 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

22 references

Each of the 38 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. 10 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 Chamaeleonidae

Credit
Rod Waddington
Licence
CC BY-SA 2.0
Commercial use
the licence allows it

No 3D scan of Chamaeleonidae 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 itAcrodonta through timeFormations of the MioceneThe world it lived on

Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0. Gray 1825