Gyracanthus formosus Fish Spine

The spine fossil of a Gyracanthus formosus fish (front pectoral fin). Not much is known about this fish as all that is found of remains are spines. Fossil was found Newsham Colliery of Northumberland England. This fish existed in the Middle Carboniferous Period (325 million years ago).

Fossil on display at American Museum of Natural History in New York City USA as of July 2018.

Asaphus Trilobite Fossil Displayed at AMNH

I visited the American Museum of Natural History (AMNH) in New York city this month. It is a massive museum that I could not see in one day. Not for a lack of trying, in that I arrived well before they opened and left when they were about to close. My camera battery depleted about 30 minutes before I left.

While impressive displays and specimens are shown there, for an invertebrate fossil enthusiast, I was a little disappointed. They list their collection of these types of fossils at over 400,000 specimens but I think saw less than 30 on display. In the Grand Gallery was a trilobite display case with world-class specimens. This trilobite fossil was in the Ordovician section and named Asaphus kowalewskii. It was found in the Asery Formation of St. Petersburg, Russia. Accession number is Fl-74836 and was donated by the family of James Kaste.

The museum is a great place to visit. Their dinosaur collection has to be one of the best on Earth and I really liked the display on fossil sharks. Learn more about the museum at https://www.amnh.org/

Their trilobite exhibit was made possible by Dr. Martin Shugar, M.D. and Andy Secher who are also editors for the AMNH trilobite web site.

Egyptian-Greek Lion Statue Containing Fossils at The Met

Recently, I visited New York City's Metropolitan Museum of Art located at 1000 Fifth Avenue and 82nd Street. It is an amazing museum. According to Wikipedia it is the 3rd most visited art museum and 5th most visited museum of any kind in the world (as of 2016).  They have extensive artworks from cultures all around the world including ancient Egypt and Greece.

While art and paleontology do not often mix I was able to find a few fossils in an item at the ancient Egypt exhibit.

The fossils were found while visiting the 15 BC Egyptian-Roman Temple of Dendur room, to the right of the temple when facing it are a number of artifacts (see above image of room). One is a reclining lion statue with a number of visible foraminiferan Nummulites fossils on it. The statue is from the Roman period (second to third century A.D.) from Bubastis Egypt. It is made from what appears to be an Eocene limestone from Egypt. A Greek inscription is in the front of the statue that translates to "Thnepheros daughter of Pitikas dedicated for good". Greek custom at the time was to use lion sculptures as funeral monuments. The museum bought the statue from the Egyptian government in 1912.

As for nummulite shell fossils, ancient Egyptians used them as coins and their name is derived from the Latin nummulus meaning "little coin".  This type of limestone was used to construct the pyramids so they contain these fossils as well. Learn more at Wikipedia.