Abstract
FOR more than, a century, since the days of the pioneer workers on the Old Red Sandstone, the osteolepid fishes have proved a source of difficulty to vertebrate palæontologists, and even more so to stratigraphers. One has only to glance at the restorations of the whole fishes on p. 103 of Dr. E. Javik's recent monograph* and of the heads of the various forms dealt with to understand why. For so uniform in general are their characters that unless the bodies are well enough preserved to show the details and the disposition of the fins it is almost impossible to be certain even of the genus, and if the skull-roof is not clearly shown then the species is more often than not in doubt ; and finely preserved bodies and clearly detailed heads are not so very common in these ancient strata, laid down 300 million years ago. The long historical accounts of each of the three genera and seven species described clearly indicate the confusion that has arisen in the past, and even Dr. Jarvik's exhaustive investigations leave some loose ends for future workers to tie up.
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WHITE, E. Middle Devonian Osteolepid Fishes of Scotland. Nature 163, 419 (1949). https://doi.org/10.1038/163419a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/163419a0