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Geological Periods

 

Geological Time Periods are so long ago and cover such vast eras, it is difficult for the ordinary mortal to quite grasp the immensity of it all. However, most of us will be familiar with the term ‘Jurassic’ thanks to the film industry and, avid followers of the Discovery Channels and other programmes that look back into the distant past will have no doubt heard about the mass extinction at 65 million years ago when the large dinosaurs were finally doomed. But don’t think that this was the only mass extinction in history. There were others at 505, 438, 360, 248, 213, 144 and 30 million years ago.

To help you try to put all this into some sort of context and get some sort of idea the time-scales involved, we have put a table below.

The figures must all be read as a quantity of  ‘Millions Of Years Ago’ - MYA.

The events are meant as a rough guide only (after all not even all the scientists agree on everything) and for more accurate information further research should be carried out.

 

Pre-Cambrian – 4,600 to 570 MYA

This saw the formation of the Earth and the Moon at about 4,600 million years ago.

Life is thought to have begun at about 4,000 million years ago.

The first micro-organisms, bacteria and blue-green algae appeared about 3,100 million years ago.

The atmosphere became oxygenated at about 1,900 million years ago.

The first multi-celled organisms appeared about 1,400 million years ago.

And soft-bodied creatures were around by about 800 million years ago.

 

Palaeozoic

Cambrian – 570 to 505 MYA

This period saw the diversification of life in the sea.

 

Ordovician – 505 to 438 MYA

Sea creatures continued to flourish.

 

Silurian – 438 to 408 MYA

The end of this period saw the start of plants on land.

 

Devonian – 408 to 360 MYA

Wingless insects appeared.

 

Carboniferous – 360 to 286 MYA

Amphibians and reptiles came to the fore.

 

Permian – 286 to 248 MYA

The predecessors or Dinosaurs appeared.

 

Mesozoic

Triassic – 248 to 208 MYA

Dinosaurs flourished.

 

Jurassic – 208 to 144 MYA

The first small mammals were now around and more dinosaurs came along.

 

Cretaceous – 144 to 65 MYA

The first birds appeared and more dinosaurs flourished. However, at the end of this period, the large dinosaurs became extinct and mammals were finally able to come out of the shadows and evolve into dominant creatures on the planet.

 

Tertiary

Palaeocene – 65 to 55 MYA

                   Early primates appeared.

          Eocene – 55 to 38 MYA

          Oligocene – 38 to 25 MYA

                   More and larger mammals.

          Miocene – 25 to 5 MYA

                   Apes and monkeys appear.

          Pliocene – 5 to 2 million years ago

                   Early men appear on the scene.

 

Quaternary

Pleistocene – 2 MYA to 10,000 years ago

          Enter Modern Man, the Woolly Mammoth & Sabre Toothed Cat and the start of the Old Stone Age.

Holocene – 10, 000 years ago to the present time

          See our Historic Periods page.