Aesopus

Aesopus is a genus of sea snails, marine gastropod mollusks in the family Columbellidae, the dove snails.

Aesopus

Manuel CABALLER · CC BY 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
Also called
dovesnailPBDB
Sits inside
ColumbellidaePBDB
Diet
carnivorePBDB, for Columbellidae
Life habit
epifaunalPBDB, for Columbellidae
Motility
actively mobilePBDB, for Columbellidae
Vision
limitedPBDB, for Gastropoda

Time the record covers

At least 3.4 million years on record.

The record covers at least 3.6 Mya to 129 ka. No occurrence read is dated outside 5.333 Mya to 11.7 ka.

Miocene — about 0 of 38 occurrencesPliocene — about 10 of 38 occurrencesPliocenePleistocene — about 28 of 38 occurrencesPleistoceneHolocene — about 0 of 38 occurrences5.4–5.3 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences5.3–5.1 Mya — about 0.6 occurrences5.1–4.9 Mya — about 0.6 occurrences4.9–4.7 Mya — about 0.6 occurrences4.7–4.5 Mya — about 0.6 occurrences4.5–4.3 Mya — about 0.6 occurrences4.3–4.1 Mya — about 0.6 occurrences4.1–3.9 Mya — about 0.6 occurrences3.9–3.7 Mya — about 0.6 occurrences3.7–3.5 Mya — about 0.7 occurrences3.5–3.3 Mya — about 0.9 occurrences3.3–3.1 Mya — about 0.9 occurrences3.1–2.9 Mya — about 0.9 occurrences2.9–2.7 Mya — about 0.9 occurrences2.7–2.5 Mya — about 0.9 occurrences2.5–2.3 Mya — about 1 occurrence2.3–2.1 Mya — about 1 occurrence2.1–1.9 Mya — about 1 occurrence1.9–1.8 Mya — about 1.0 occurrences1.8–1.6 Mya — about 0.9 occurrences1.6–1.4 Mya — about 0.9 occurrences1.4–1.2 Mya — about 0.9 occurrences1.2–972 ka Mya — about 0.9 occurrences972 ka–778 ka Mya — about 0.9 occurrences778 ka–583 ka Mya — about 1 occurrence583 ka–389 ka Mya — about 1 occurrence389 ka–194 ka Mya — about 1 occurrence194 ka–0 Mya — about 16 occurrences3.6 Mya129 ka5.8 Mya0 Mya

38 occurrences of Aesopus on record, most of them in the Pleistocene. The Paleobiology Database records this as a living group. 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

38 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

12 formations

Palos Verdes Sand — 33.60°N, 117.88°WPalos Verdes Sand — 33.74°N, 118.28°WTalparo — 10.67°N, 61.07°WSan Pedro Sand — 33.74°N, 118.28°WPalos Verdes — 33.63°N, 117.90°WCaloosahatchee — 27.77°N, 82.68°WCaloosahatchee — 26.75°N, 80.93°WChowan RIver — 35.28°N, 76.65°WJames City — 35.28°N, 76.65°WWaccamaw — 34.33°N, 78.20°WDuplin — 34.90°N, 78.05°WCanoa — 0.20°N, 80.27°WMare — 10.61°N, 63.52°WQuaternary terrace — 33.79°N, 118.41°W

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The named rock units Aesopus has been recovered from, largest first. Drawn where the rock is now, not where it formed. 4 occurrences have no formation on record, which is common for older literature.

Aesopus and its relatives

Pleistocene

Where Aesopus and its relatives were recorded in the Pleistocene.

Found in the same rock

1,599 taxa

The Paleobiology Database records 25 sites for Aesopus, 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

15 references

Each of the 38 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. 3 further references are 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 content1

Picture of Aesopus

Credit
Manuel CABALLER
Licence
CC BY 4.0
Commercial use
the licence allows it

No 3D scan of Aesopus 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

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 itColumbellidae through timeFormations of the PleistoceneThe world it lived on

Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0. (Gould 1860)