Rhus

Sumac or sumach —not to be confused with poison sumac—is any of the roughly 35 species of flowering plants in the genus Rhus of the cashew and mango tree family, Anacardiaceae. However, it is Rhus coriaria that is most commonly used for culinary purposes. Sumac is prized as a spice—especially in Middle Eastern cuisine—and used as a dye and holistic remedy. The plants grow in subtropical and temperate regions, on nearly every continent except Antarctica and South America. It holds cultural significance as a symbolic item on the Haft-sin table during Nowruz, the Persian New Year.

Rhus

Oneconscious at English Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 3.0 · 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
sumacPBDB
Sits inside
AnacardiaceaePBDB
Diet
"photoautotroph"PBDB, for Angiospermae

Time the record covers

At least 72 million years on record.

The record covers at least 72.2 Mya to 11.7 ka. No occurrence read is dated outside 83.6 Mya to 0 Mya.

Late Cretaceous — about 1 of 113 occurrencesLate CretaceousPaleocene — about 0 of 113 occurrencesEocene — about 44 of 113 occurrencesEoceneOligocene — about 20 of 113 occurrencesOligoceneMiocene — about 25 of 113 occurrencesMiocenePliocene — about 2 of 113 occurrencesPleistocene — about 18 of 113 occurrences85–82 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences82–80 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences80–77 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences77–74 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences74–71 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences57–54 Mya — about 3 occurrences54–51 Mya — about 4 occurrences51–48 Mya — about 5 occurrences48–45 Mya — about 8 occurrences45–43 Mya — about 6 occurrences43–40 Mya — about 6 occurrences40–37 Mya — about 5 occurrences37–34 Mya — about 7 occurrences34–31 Mya — about 7 occurrences31–28 Mya — about 7 occurrences28–26 Mya — about 4 occurrences26–23 Mya — about 2 occurrences23–20 Mya — about 3 occurrences20–17 Mya — about 4 occurrences17–14 Mya — about 5 occurrences14–11 Mya — about 7 occurrences11–8.5 Mya — about 3 occurrences8.5–5.7 Mya — about 3 occurrences5.7–2.8 Mya — about 2 occurrences2.8–0 Mya — about 21 occurrences72.2 Mya11.7 ka85 Mya0 Mya

113 occurrences of Rhus on record, most of them in the Eocene. 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

113 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

29 formations

Florissant — 38.92°N, 105.25°WGreen River — 39.78°N, 107.87°WGreen River — 39.00°N, 110.10°WGreen River — 39.00°N, 110.00°WGreen River — 41.84°N, 109.35°WGreen River — 41.10°N, 109.30°WGreen River — 41.84°N, 110.70°WRenova — 45.20°N, 112.16°WRenova — 45.50°N, 112.50°WJohn Day — 44.64°N, 120.30°WJohn Day — 45.00°N, 120.20°WJohn Day — 44.15°N, 120.31°WClarno — 44.74°N, 120.47°WClarno — 44.58°N, 120.25°WClarno — 44.74°N, 120.42°WOlduvai — 2.96°S, 35.31°EBopesta — 35.30°N, 118.50°WMotojuku — 36.25°N, 138.75°ECoatzingo — 18.59°N, 97.93°WBagshot — 50.72°N, 2.00°WNanlin — 25.12°N, 98.83°EKlondike Mountain — 48.65°N, 118.73°WOgawa — 36.42°N, 138.08°EIone — 39.31°N, 120.96°WSepulcher — 44.00°N, 110.00°WOdderup — 54.93°N, 10.27°EBeaverdam — 42.24°N, 114.08°WTemblor — 36.14°N, 120.36°WBlack Creek — 34.31°N, 79.84°WBangmai — 23.90°N, 100.02°EBuxin — 23.18°N, 112.88°EDalianhe — 46.00°N, 129.00°EGuchengzi — 41.84°N, 123.90°EShanwang — 36.55°N, 118.71°E

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The named rock units Rhus has been recovered from, largest first. Drawn where the rock is now, not where it formed. 5 further formations hold fewer occurrences each and are not listed. 50 occurrences have no formation on record, which is common for older literature.

Rhus and its relatives

Eocene

Where Rhus and its relatives were recorded in the Eocene.

Found in the same rock

1,381 taxa

The Paleobiology Database records 80 sites for Rhus, 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

41 references

Each of the 113 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. 29 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 Rhus

Credit
Oneconscious at English Wikipedia
Licence
CC BY-SA 3.0
Commercial use
the licence allows it

No 3D scan of Rhus 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

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 itAnacardiaceae through timeFormations of the EoceneThe world it lived on

Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0. Linnaeus 1753