Two Proetid (Timsaloproetus?) Trilobites - Jorf, Morocco

This is a nicely inflated pair of proetid trilobites collected from the Jorf "Red Site" in Morocco. The species is possibly undescribed, but the genus seems to closely match Timsaloproetus. The larger specimen is .68" long and they have beautifully preserved shell.

Trilobites were a very diverse group of extinct marine arthropods. They first appeared in the fossil record in the Early Cambrian (521 million years ago) and went extinct during the Permian mass extinction (250 million years ago). They were one of the most successful of the early animals on our planet: over 25,000 species have been described, filling nearly every evolutionary niche. Due in large part to their hard exoskeletons (shells), they left an excellent fossil record.

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