Confuciusornis

Confuciusornis

Tommy from Arad · CC BY 2.0 · via Wikidata/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
ConfuciusornithidaePBDB
Diet
carnivorePBDB, for Coelurosauria
Life habit
ground dwelling, solitaryPBDB, for Theropoda
Motility
actively mobilePBDB, for Theropoda
Environment
terrestrialPBDB, for Theropoda
Length
0.25 mWikidata

Time the record covers

At most 13 million years on record.

Every occurrence read is dated to somewhere between 125.77 Mya and 113.2 Mya, and nothing in the dating separates them, so that window is what the record shows rather than a span.

Early Cretaceous — about 19 of 19 occurrencesEarly Cretaceous126–125 Mya — about 0.9 occurrences125–125 Mya — about 1 occurrence125–124 Mya — about 1 occurrence124–124 Mya — about 1 occurrence124–124 Mya — about 1 occurrence124–123 Mya — about 1 occurrence123–123 Mya — about 1 occurrence123–122 Mya — about 1 occurrence122–122 Mya — about 1 occurrence122–121 Mya — about 1 occurrence121–121 Mya — about 1 occurrence121–120 Mya — about 1 occurrence120–120 Mya — about 1 occurrence120–119 Mya — about 1 occurrence119–119 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences119–119 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences119–118 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences118–118 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences118–117 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences117–117 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences117–116 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences116–116 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences116–115 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences115–115 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences115–115 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences115–114 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences114–114 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences114–113 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences126.3 Mya112.7 Mya

19 occurrences of Confuciusornis on record, most of them in the Early 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

19 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

Yixian — 41.80°N, 120.73°EYixian — 41.60°N, 120.87°EYixian — 41.60°N, 120.98°EYixian — 41.59°N, 121.63°EYixian — 41.42°N, 118.97°EYixian — 41.56°N, 120.82°EJiufotang — 41.42°N, 120.18°EJiufotang — 43.64°N, 120.43°EJiufotang — 41.57°N, 120.16°EJiufotang — 40.59°N, 119.58°EJiufotang — 40.65°N, 119.68°E

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The named rock units Confuciusornis has been recovered from, largest first. Drawn where the rock is now, not where it formed.

Confuciusornis and its relatives

Early Cretaceous

Where Confuciusornis and its relatives were recorded in the Early Cretaceous.

Found in the same rock

95 taxa

The Paleobiology Database records 17 sites for Confuciusornis, 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

13 references

Each of the 19 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. 1 further reference is 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 content3

Picture of Confuciusornis

Credit
Tommy from Arad
Licence
CC BY 2.0
Commercial use
the licence allows it

CT scan

Licence
In Copyright
Commercial use
cannot be read from the licence given — check the record
Specimen
Confuciusornis sanctus · none:none:PMOL-AB00201

3D model

Source
Sketchfab
Licence
CC Attribution-NonCommercial
Commercial use
the licence does not allow it

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

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

Keep going

What may have been alongside itConfuciusornithidae through timeFormations of the Early CretaceousThe world it lived on

Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0. Hou et al. 1995