living fossil

plural living fossils

1. evolutionary theoryAny species discovered first as a fossil and believed extinct, but which is later found living; an organism that has remained unchanged over geological periods.First known use 1859

   The coelacanth and the dawn redwood are living fossils.

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   [I]n fresh water we find some of the most anomalous forms now known in the world, as the Ornithorhynchus and Lepidosiren, which, like fossils, connect to a certain extent orders now widely separated in the natural scale. These anomalous forms may almost be called living fossils; they have endured to the present day, from having inhabited a confined area, and from having thus been exposed to less severe competition.

   1859 November 24, Charles Darwin, “Natural Selection”, in On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection, […], London: John Murray, […], →OCLC, page 107

   The Gingko, whose single existing species was aptly termed a living fossil by [Charles] Darwin and which survived to modern times only in eastern Asia and is now a prized ornamental tree in all temperate countries, has an ancestral history that goes back to remote geologic time.

   1929 April 18, Edward W[ilber] Berry, “A Revision of the Flora of the Latah Formation”, in W[alter] C[urran] Mendenhall, editor, Shorter Contributions to General Geology 1928 (U.S. Geological Survey Professional Paper; 154), Washington, D.C.: United States Government Printing Office, →OCLC, page 229, column 1

   It features in textbooks as well, a prime example of a "living fossil", a reminder of past glories now hanging on in a last-ditch action against final extinction. But is nautilus really an anachronism?

   1986 October 23, Martin Wells, “Legend of the Living Fossil”, in Michael Kenward, editor, New Scientist, volume 112, number 1531, London: New Science Publications, →ISSN, →OCLC, page 36, column 1

   Angus: Impossible! If what you say is true, he'd have to be thousands of years old. / Rothie: Astounding! The age-o-meter dates your particles all the way back to 25 B.A., twenty-five years before Aku enslaved the Earth. You, my friend, are a living fossil. / Jack: So the question is not where I am but when I am. […] The spell Aku cast must have ripped me from my own time and flung me into the distant future.

   2001 August 10, Paul Rudish, Genndy Tartakovsky, “Samurai Jack: The Premiere Movie – Part II: The Samurai Called Jack”, in Samurai Jack, season 1, episode 2

2. evolutionary theoryAny living species which very closely resembles fossil relatives in most anatomical details.

   Crocodiles are living fossils that haven’t changed their appearance much in millions of years.

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   Living in apparently splendid ease, travelling with a retinue of seventy, demanding the many courtesies due to a peer of the realm, exacting from his many manors rents and incidentals such as private wardships, in exactly the same way as did the lay lords, and making the most of his public appearances in the role either of judge or of administrator, [Matthew] Parker seemed to some an anachronism. He seemed to be a living fossil from 'the days of popery' (as contemporaries, lacking an historical sense and groping for an expression adequate to convey what they meant, called the medieval era).

   1967 April, J. I. Daeley, “Pluralism in the Diocese of Canterbury during the Administration of Matthew Parker, 1559–1575”, in C. W. Dugmore, editor, The Journal of Ecclesiastical History, volume XVIII, number 1, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, →ISSN, →OCLC, page 34

   There are four living families of Anaspidacea, but only the Anaspididae are of interest in the context of "living fossils" since they bear the closest resemblance to the extinct Palaeocaridacea.

   1984, Frederick R[obert] Schram, Robert R. Hessler, “Anaspidid Syncarida”, in Niles Eldredge, Steven M. Stanley, editors, Living Fossils (Casebooks in Earth Sciences), New York, N.Y.: Springer Verlag, →ISBN; 1st paperback edition, New York, N.Y.: Springer Verlag, 1984, →DOI, →ISBN, →ISSN

   These relics of Europe’s dawning are deserving of special recognition, for they are in effect Europe’s living fossils, as precious as the platypus and lungfish.

   2018, Tim Flannery, Europe: A Natural History, page 34

   Tucker-Brown explained how lemurs—like much of the “stranded” flora and fauna of Madagascar—are effectively living fossils. Belonging to a primate group called prosimians, lemurs were evolutionarily superseded by monkeys on mainland Africa 35mn years ago and driven to near-extinction.

   2025 July 5, Mike Carter, “Deep in the island ark”, in FT Weekend (Travel section), London: The Financial Times Ltd., →ISSN, →OCLC, page 6