fossil record

Cultural

A term used by paleontologists (see paleontology) to refer to the total number of fossils that have been discovered, as well as to the information derived from them. (See evolution of Earth.)

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fossil record

Complete skeletons are uncommon in the fossil record, so the researchers relied on much smaller clues: teeth and pieces of jaw.

From Science Daily ● Jul. 19, 2026

The discovery helps to reveal more about how these beasts lived in a part of the world where the fossil record is sparse.

From BBC ● Jun. 29, 2026

Like many other Ediacaran organisms, they vanished from the fossil record at the start of the Cambrian period roughly 540 million years ago.

From Science Daily ● Jun. 10, 2026

Finding them in rocks this old would have pushed back the fossil record for these organisms significantly.

From Science Daily ● May 12, 2026

The fossil record speaks to us unambiguously of creatures that once were present in enormous numbers and that have now vanished utterly.'

From "Cosmos" by Carl Sagan

Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023