Porolepis
Searched as Porolepis cf. posaniensis. The Paleobiology Database treats Porolepis as the accepted name.
Porolepis is an extinct genus of porolepiform sarcopterygian fish, from the Early Devonian Dniester Series of Ukraine, which is rich in Porolepis remains, and also the Nellen Koepfchen Beds of Germany. It lived alongside the dubious lophotrochozoan Macrodontophion. It was first described in 1858 but Porolepis was not named as a sufficient species until 1891.

Dmitry Bogdanov · 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
- PorolepididaePBDB
- Motility
- actively mobilePBDB, for Osteichthyes
Time the record covers
At most 12 million years on record.
The one occurrence read is dated to somewhere between 410.62 Mya and 399.5 Mya, which is a dating window rather than a span.
1 occurrence of Porolepis 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
1 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
1 formation
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The named rock units Porolepis has been recovered from, largest first. Drawn where the rock is now, not where it formed.
Porolepis and its relatives
DevonianWhere Porolepis and its relatives were recorded in the Devonian.
Found in the same rock
70 taxa- Homostius2 sites
- Laliacanthus singularis2 sites
- Acanthodes1 site
- Acanthodii1 site
- Actinolepis1 site
- Actinolepis tuberculata1 site
- Actinolepis zaikai1 site
- Adelophthalmus sievertsi1 site
- Alkenia mirabilis1 site
- Alkenopterus brevitelson1 site
- Amaltheolepis1 site
- Archaeomartus levis1 site
- Archaeometa1 site
- Arthrodira1 site
- Balticaspis latvica1 site
- Byssacanthus dilatatus1 site
- Carcinosoma1 site
- Cephalaspidida1 site
- Cheiracanthus1 site
- Cheirolepis1 site
- Cheirolepis gracilis1 site
- Climatiidae1 site
- Dawsonites1 site
- Diplacanthus1 site
The Paleobiology Database records 6 sites for Porolepis, 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
1 referenceEach of the 1 occurrence 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. Each entry links to doi.org. Relayed as the Paleobiology Database holds them, not checked against what they resolve to.
Media and terms
Media content1
Picture of Porolepis
- Source
- Wikipedia/Commons
- Credit
- Dmitry Bogdanov
- Licence
- CC BY-SA 4.0
- Commercial use
- the licence allows it
No 3D scan of Porolepis was found in Sketchfab.
Smithsonian Open Access and MorphoSource were 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, “Porolepis”
- 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 itPorolepididae through timeFormations of the DevonianThe world it lived on
Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0. Woodward 1891