Meanings
comparative more fossiliferous · superlative most fossiliferous
- Containing fossils.
The area contains a great thickness of well exposed fossiliferous, marine strata of uppermost Cretaceous and Eocene age, and it is felt that the most continuous and complete section may be found here.
1951, Max B Payne, Type Moreno formation and overlying Eocene strata on the West Side of the San Joaquin Valley, Fresno and Merced Counties, California, page 31 more example
Having already described him [the whale] in most of his present habitatory and anatomical peculiarities, it now remains to magnify him in an archæological, fossiliferous, and antediluvian point of view.
1851 November 14, Herman Melville, “The Fossil Whale”, in Moby-Dick; or, The Whale, 1st American edition, New York, N.Y.: Harper & Brothers; London: Richard Bentley, →OCLC, page 506
Origin
- Latinfoss-
- Latinfossili
- Frenchfossile
- Englishfossil
- Proto-Indo-European*bʰer-
- Proto-Indo-European*bʰéreti
- Proto-Italic*ferō
- Latinferō
- Proto-Indo-European*h₃ed-
- Proto-Indo-European*h₃édosder.?
- Englishfossiliferous
Translations
Finnish fossiilipitoinen
- fossiilipitoinencontaining fossils
French fossilifère
- fossilifèrecontaining fossils
German fossilführend, fossilienhaltig
- fossilführendcontaining fossils
- fossilienhaltigcontaining fossils
Greek απολιθωματοφόρος
- απολιθωματοφόρος (apolithomatofóros)containing fossils
Italian fossilifero
- fossiliferocontaining fossils
Rhymes & wordplay
Rhymes with fossiliferous
Cite this entry
fossiliferous. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 2, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/fossiliferous
“fossiliferous.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/fossiliferous. Accessed November 2, 2026.
WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “fossiliferous,” accessed November 2, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/fossiliferous.
Source: fossiliferous on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.