Morocops
Morocops is a phacopid trilobite in the family Phacopidae. They were previously considered part of the Phacops genus, but were later reclassified as their own genus.

DarkCryst · CC BY-SA 4.0 · 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
- PhacopinaePBDB
- Diet
- carnivorePBDB, for Phacopina
- Life habit
- low-level epifaunalPBDB, for Trilobita
- Motility
- fast-movingPBDB, for Trilobita
- Vision
- well-developedPBDB, for Phacopidae
- Environment
- marinePBDB, for Trilobita
Time the record covers
At most 23 million years on record.
Every occurrence read is dated to somewhere between 410.62 Mya and 387.95 Mya, and nothing in the dating separates them, so that window is what the record shows rather than a span.
19 occurrences of Morocops on record, most of them in the Devonian. 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- Devonian100%
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
5 formations
- Amerboh Formation8
- Timrhanrhart Formation4
- Chefar el Ahmar Formation4
- Chefar el Ahmar Formation1
- El Otfal Formation1
Loading coastlines…
The named rock units Morocops has been recovered from, largest first. Drawn where the rock is now, not where it formed. 1 occurrence has no formation on record, which is common for older literature.
Morocops and its relatives
DevonianWhere Morocops and its relatives were recorded in the Devonian.
Found in the same rock
76 taxa- Austerops menchikoffi5 sites
- Hollardops mesocristata4 sites
- Austerops speculator3 sites
- Cyphaspis hamidi3 sites
- Geesops fabrei3 sites
- Gerastos tuberculatus marocensis3 sites
- Austerops legrandi2 sites
- Cornuproetus2 sites
- Cyphaspis2 sites
- Cyphaspis agayuara2 sites
- Gerastos2 sites
- Phacops2 sites
- Pinnuloharpes hamarlaghdadensis2 sites
- Walliserops2 sites
- Acanthopyge1 site
- Acastoides haddadi1 site
- Acastoides zguilmensis1 site
- Amoenophyllites doeringi1 site
- Amoenospirifer1 site
- Anarcestes plebeius1 site
- Asteropyge (Comura)1 site
- Aulacopleura beyrichi1 site
- Aulocystis1 site
- Aulopora1 site
The Paleobiology Database records 11 sites for Morocops, 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- Trilobites from the Red Fauna (latest Emsian, Devonian) of Hamar Laghdad, Morocco and their biodiversity4
- A trilobite faunule from the Lower Devonian of the Saoura Valley, Algeria: biodiversity, morphological variability and palaeobiogeographical affinities4
- Trilobites from the upper Lower to Middle Devonian Timrhanrhart Formation, Jbel Gara el Zguilma, southern Morocco4
- Oases of biodiversity: Early Devonian palaeoecology at Hamar Laghdad, Morocco2
- Early and Middle Devonian Phacopidae (Trilobita) of southern Morocco2
- Middle Devonian trilobites of the Saoura Valley, Algeria: insights into their biodiversity and Moroccan affinities1
- Trilobite sclerites as attachment surface for Emsian tabulate corals of Hamar Laghdad (Anti-Atlas, Morocco)1
- Red Devonian trilobites with green eyes from Morocco and the silicification of the trilobite exoskeleton1
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. 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 Morocops
- Source
- Wikipedia/Commons
- Credit
- DarkCryst
- Licence
- CC BY-SA 4.0
- Commercial use
- the licence allows it
No 3D scan of Morocops 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
- Source
- Wikipedia, “Morocops”
- 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 itPhacopinae through timeFormations of the DevonianThe world it lived on
Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0. Basse 2006