GASTROPOD OF THE ITALIAN PENINSULA

A beautiful example of two water-worn specimens of the gastropod Persististrombus latus (Gmelin, 1791) captured after a storm captured by the deeply awesome José Juárez Ruiz from Palma De Mallorca, Spain.

In his original description of Strombus latus, Gmelin describes this new species in his paper from 1791, page 3520: "latus. 35. Str. testae labro prominulo inferne bis emarginato, spirae anfractu primo medio laevi utrinque transversim striato, reliquis nodis obtusis coronatis."

Persististrombus latus is the most iconic representative of the Senegalese fauna, a fossil assemblage of tropical water organisms thought to have colonized the Mediterranean Sea during the last interglacial period.

This lovely Eocene gastropod has become an important stratigraphic marker of Marine Isotope Stage (MIS) 5.5, which allows for the correlation of raised coastal deposits, useful in studying sea-level variations and tectonic uplift.

Persististrombus latus is found in shallow marine sediments of Tyrrhenian age (∼124 ka) in several localities of the Italian peninsula. Gmelin's early work on the species is from upper Pleistocene deposits of the marine terraces of the Crotone peninsula of southern Italy. If you fancy a visit to this locality, head to: N38°45'00" - N39°04'60", E17°04'60" - E17°19'60".

Commonly known as the Bubonian Conch, this species of sea snail is a marine gastropod mollusk in the family Strombidae, the true conchs. These fellows are herbivorous, dining on wee bits of algae, seagrass and other detritus found along the seafloor. They grow to around 2.76" - 6.5" (7cm - 16.5cm). We find them in the fossil record and also as modern shells in the Atlantic Ocean along West Africa, Senegal, Gabon, Cape Verde, Ascension Island and Angola. They like it warm, preferring seas of 57.2 °F - 68 °F (14°C - 20°C).

Ronald Nalin, Valentina Alice Bracchi, Daniela Basso, Francesco Massari; Persististrombus latus (Gmelin) in the upper Pleistocene deposits of the marine terraces of the Crotone peninsula (southern Italy). Italian Journal of Geosciences ; 131 (1): 95–101. doi: https://doi.org/10.3301/IJG.2011.25

Gmelin J.F. (1791). Vermes. In: Gmelin J.F. (Ed.) Caroli a Linnaei Systema Naturae per Regna Tria Naturae, Ed. 13. Tome 1(6). G.E. Beer, Lipsiae [Leipzig]. pp. 3021-3910.

NUMMULITES FORAMINIFERA OF THE PYRAMIDS

Built to endure the tests of time, the pyramids of Giza were built of limestone, granite, basalt, gypsum (mortar), and baked mud bricks quarried at Giza and sites further up the river Nile at Aswan.

Together they form some of the oldest (and last remaining) wonders of the ancient world. 

The great pyramids of Giza, with their smooth exteriors carved from fine grain white limestone quarried at Tura on the Giza-plateau, are built from stone that speaks of Egypt's much older geologic history.

The limestone from Tura was the finest and whitest of all the Egyptian quarries and chosen for the facing stones for the richest tombs. It is interesting in that it is made up almost entirely of Nummulites, a lovely single-celled organism. Nummulites (Lamarck, 1801) are the calcareous chambered shells (tests) of extinct forms of marine, amoeba-like organisms  — protozoans or protists — called foraminifera that accumulated in huge quantities during the early Cenozoic. They look very much like little white, round crackers or cross-sections of plants with their concentric rings.

Imagine millions of them with their wee calcium carbonate skeletons living, dying and sinking to the seafloor. Over time, these little lovelies gathered in layers, pressure and time doing the rest. They became cemented together and helped form some of the most beautiful limestones we have today. It is remarkable to think that Khufu or Cheops, the Great Pyramid of Egypt, the oldest and largest of the pyramids at Giza built back in the 4th dynasty golden age and the only remaining wonder of the ancient world, is made up of teeny, tiny single-celled fossils — mindblowing!

They are commonly found as fossils in Eocene to Miocene marine rocks, particularly around southwest Asia and the Mediterranean — including the Eocene limestones of Egypt that lived in the Tethys sea.

Fossil Nummulites / Urbasa, Navarre

Foraminifera are still alive in our oceans, though none quite as large as Nummulites. Nummulites vary in diameter from very small, just 1.3 cm (0.5 inches) to 5 cm (2 inches) but grew much larger, up to six inches wide back in the Middle Eocene.

The small size of most cells has to do with how they move the nutrients they need across their cell membrane — a process called diffusion. 

Nummulites grew much larger, six inches is mighty big for a single-celled organism, because of their overall design. They evolved to increase their surface area and create a greater opportunity for diffusion. Clever.

In our modern Nummulites, we see a symbiotic relationship with algae that allowed them to grow much larger. Each of these little fellows has a community of them living with him. Lorraine Casazza, a University of California at Berkeley paleontologist did some great work on the nummulites from Egypt.

For the central chamber, with the sarcophagus of the pharaoh, lovely reddish-pink granite from Aswan was used. The granite helped to take the weight of this massive construction. The ancient Egyptians also used nummulite shells as coins. It is not surprising then that the name "Nummulites" is a diminutive form of the Latin nummulus meaning "little coin," a direct reference to their shape and usage.

A Nummulite Protozoan Foraminiferan

Back in 2013, archaeologists made an unlikely find in a cave seven hundred kilometres from Giza. 

Their find, a 4,600-year-old papyrus scroll, details an ancient shipload of rock, likely destined for  Khufu's pyramid, the pyramid that would later be known as the Great Pyramid of Giza.

The papyrus is addressed to Ankh-haf, Khufu’s half-brother, and describes the undertaking of an expedition by a 200-man crew to the limestone quarries near Tura, on the eastern shore of the Nile. After loading the blocks onto their ship, the expedition indented to float down the river Nile for a successful delivery. They were then joined by another 100,000 slaves who had the unenviable task of unloading the 2-3 ton blocks of limestone built from nummulites, then pulling them across ramps to be dragged to the construction site.

It is amazing to have documentation from the 4th dynasty and poetic that this shipping order should be for materials, immortalized first as nummulites in the Eocene, excavated, carved and immortalized at Giza.

Herodotus' Histories, Book VIII

The Greek historian Herodotus visited Egypt during the construction of Khufu's pyramid by more than 100,000 slaves. Herodotus wasn't a fan of Khufu, describing him as a cruel tyrant.

In his literary work Historiae, Book II, chapter 124–126, Herodotus writes: "As long as Rhámpsinîtos was king, as they told me, there was nothing but orderly rule in Egypt, and the land prospered greatly. 

But after him Khéops became king over them and brought them to every kind of suffering: He closed all the temples; after this he kept the priests from sacrificing there and then he forced all the Egyptians to work for him.

So some were ordered to draw stones from the stone quarries in the Arabian mountains to the Nile, and others he forced to receive the stones after they had been carried over the river in boats, and to draw them to those called the Libyan mountains. 

And they worked by 100,000 men at a time, for each three months continually. Of this oppression there passed ten years while the causeway was made by which they drew the stones, which causeway they built, and it is a work not much less, as it appears to me, than the pyramid.

For the length of it is 5 furlongs and the breadth 10 fathoms and the height, where it is highest, 8 fathoms, and it is made of polished stone and with figures carved upon it. For this, they said, 10 years were spent, and for the underground chambers on the hill upon which the pyramids stand, which he caused to be made as sepulchral chambers for himself in an island, having conducted thither a channel from the Nile."

It is estimated that 5.5 million tonnes of nummulites limestone, 8,000 tonnes of granite (imported from Aswan), and 500,000 tonnes of mortar were used in the construction of the Great Pyramid. Built by an evil genius, yes, but stunning none-the-less. Unintentionally, it may have been one of the largest — and arguably cruellest — paleontological excavations ever attempted.

Photo of Fossil nummulites in Urbasa, Navarre by Theklan - Own work, CC BY-SA 2.5, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=1125411

Photo: Nummulites from above and horizontally bisected by R A Lydekker - Life and Rocks, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=3048471

Photo: Fragment from Herodotus' Histories, Book VIII on Papyrus Oxyrhynchus 2099, Early 2nd Century AD. Papyrology Rooms, Sackler Library, Oxford

References: Nummulite', Tiscali Dictionary of Animals, retrieved 17 August 2004
Hottinger, Lukas (2006-09-08). "Illustrated Glossary of terms used in foraminiferal research". Paleopolis. Retrieved 2018-11-11.

Reference: Lorraine Casazza, UCMP: https://ucmp.berkeley.edu/science/fieldnotes/casazza_0711.php

Fancy a visit to Cheops? Visit: 29°58′45″N 31°08′03″E

EGYPT: SINAI PENINSULA

Much of Egypt's history is carved in her rock. We think of Egypt as old, with remarkable human history, but the land that formed this part of the world tells us of a much older time in the Earth's past.

Egypt, officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, is a country in the northeast corner of Africa, whose territory in the Sinai Peninsula extends beyond the continental boundary with Asia.

Egypt is bordered by the Gaza Strip (Palestinian territories) and Israel to the northeast, the Gulf of Aqaba and the Red Sea to the east, Sudan to the south, Libya to the west, and the Mediterranean Sea to the north. Across the Gulf of Aqaba lies Jordan, across the Red Sea lies Saudi Arabia, and across the Mediterranean Sea lie Greece, Cyprus and Turkey, although none of these share a land border with Egypt.

Five hundred kilometres southwest of Cairo, the flat sabkha plain stretches in all directions covered by a small layer of dark, round pebbles. There are spectacular limestone pillars dotting the landscape of the wonderful karst topography. This land, once the breadbasket of Egypt and the stomping ground of the Pharaohs, is now ruled by pipelines and rusted-out trucks abandoned as wrecks marking the passage of time. Beneath the sand, rust and human history lie some very interesting geology. This rock has been sculpted both through erosion and at the hands of her craftsmen.

The rock here was formed when the Earth's crust was just beginning to cool, 4 to 2.5 billion years ago, during the Archaean. Other rock dates back to the Proterozoic when the Earth's atmosphere was just beginning to form. The oldest of these are found as inliers in Egypt’s Western Desert. The rocks making up the Eastern Desert are largely late Proterozoic in age, the time when bacteria and marine algae were the principal forms of life.

Throughout the country, this older basement is overlain by Palaeozoic sedimentary rocks. Cretaceous outcrops are common. We also find sediments that tell a story of repeated marine transgression and regressions, sea levels rising and falling, characteristic of the Cenozoic. It is from Egypt's Cenozoic geology that we get the limestones used for the great pyramids.

CETACEANS OF WASHINGTON STATE

Oligocene Fossil Whale Vertebrae, Olympic Peninsula

These lovely water-worn specimens are difficult to ID to species with certainty but they likely hail from an early baleen whale.

Found amongst the beach pebbles on the Olympic Peninsula, they are definitely cetacean and very likely baleen as this area is home to some of the earliest baleen whales in the Pacific Northwest.

In 1993, a twenty-seven million-year-old specimen was discovered in deposits nearby that represents a new species of early baleen whale. It is especially interesting as it is from a stage in the group’s evolutionary history when baleen whales transitioned from having teeth to filtering food with baleen bristles. Visiting researcher Carlos Mauricio Peredo studied the fossil whale remains, publishing his research to solidify Sitsqwayk cornishorum (pronounced sits-quake) in the annals of history.

Baby Gray Whale, Eschrichtius robustus, showing his baleen

The earliest baleen whales clearly had teeth, and clearly still used them. Modern baleen whales have no teeth and have instead evolved baleen plates for filter feeding. I've included a rather good close-up of a baby Gray Whale here that shows the baleen to good effect.

The baleen is the comb-like strainer that sits on the upper jaw of baleen whales and is used to filter food.

We have to ponder when this evolutionary change —moving from teeth to baleen — occurred and what factors might have caused it. Traditionally, we have sought answers about the evolution of baleen whales by turning to two extinct groups: the aetiocetids and the eomysticetids.

The aetiocetids are small baleen whales that still have teeth, but they are very small, and it remains uncertain whether or not they used their teeth. In contrast, the eomysticetids are about the size of an adult Minke Whale and seem to have been much more akin to modern baleen whales; though it’s not certain if they had baleen. Baleen typically does not preserve in the fossil record being soft tissue; generally, only hard tissue, bones & teeth, are fossilized.

Photo: Oligocene Fossil Whale vertebrae from Majestic Beach, Olympic Peninsula, Washington State, USA.