Phoebodus

Phoebodus is an extinct genus of phoebodontiform total group elasmobranch, known from over a dozen species found worldwide spanning the middle to late Devonian, making it one of the oldest known total group elasmobranchs. Most species are only known from their isolated tricuspid teeth, but one species, Phoebodus saidselachus from the Late Devonian of Morocco, is known from a complete skeleton, estimated to have been 1.2 metres (3.9 ft) in total length in life, which shows that it had a slender body superficially similar to that of the living frilled shark. The teeth of Phoebodus and frilled sharks are also morphologically similar, and are designed for grasping prey. Phoebodus probably consumed small prey items that were capable of being swallowed whole. Prey of Phoebodus would have included thylacocephalans or cephalopods.

Phoebodus

Uncredited · 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
PhoebodontidaePBDB
Diet
carnivorePBDB, for Chondrichthyes
Life habit
nektonicPBDB, for Chondrichthyes
Motility
actively mobilePBDB, for Chondrichthyes

Time the record covers

At least 155 million years on record.

The record covers at least 382.31 Mya to 227.3 Mya. No occurrence read is dated outside 387.95 Mya to 205.7 Mya.

Devonian — about 25 of 28 occurrencesDevonianCarboniferous — about 1 of 28 occurrencesCarboniferousPermian — about 0 of 28 occurrencesEarly Triassic — about 0 of 28 occurrencesMiddle Triassic — about 1 of 28 occurrencesLate Triassic — about 1 of 28 occurrencesLate Triassic392–385 Mya — about 4 occurrences385–379 Mya — about 9 occurrences379–373 Mya — about 8 occurrences373–366 Mya — about 2 occurrences366–360 Mya — about 2 occurrences360–354 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences354–347 Mya — about 0.5 occurrences347–341 Mya — about 0.5 occurrences246–240 Mya — about 1 occurrence227–221 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences221–215 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences215–208 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences208–202 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences382.31 Mya227.3 Mya392 Mya202 Mya

28 occurrences of Phoebodus 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

28 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

Virgin Hills — 17.91°S, 125.90°ELyaiol' — 63.39°N, 53.77°ELyaiol' — 63.12°N, 53.76°ELyaiol' — 63.54°N, 53.78°EGneudna — 24.06°S, 115.21°EChinle — 34.44°N, 109.46°WKeokuk Limestone — 40.41°N, 91.40°WLayiol' — 63.37°N, 53.98°EWolica — 50.75°N, 20.48°ERongxian — 25.33°N, 110.26°EIbâouane — 30.85°N, 4.95°E

Loading coastlines…

The named rock units Phoebodus has been recovered from, largest first. Drawn where the rock is now, not where it formed. 13 occurrences have no formation on record, which is common for older literature.

Phoebodus and its relatives

Devonian

Where Phoebodus and its relatives were recorded in the Devonian.

Found in the same rock

155 taxa

The Paleobiology Database records 23 sites for Phoebodus, 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

11 references

Each of the 28 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 content2

Picture of Phoebodus

Credit
nobody named on the record
Licence
not stated by the source
Commercial use
cannot be read from the licence given — check the record

3D model

Source
Sketchfab
Credit
AVZ
Licence
CC Attribution
Commercial use
cannot be read from the licence given — check the record

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 itPhoebodontidae through timeFormations of the DevonianThe world it lived on

Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0. St. John and Worthen 1875