Coccosteidae, Coccosteus cuspidatus
GRI #550

Coccosteus was a predatory, armored fish that grew to nearly 40 cm in length. Its head and the front part of the body were covered with an armor of bony plates. There was a joint in the armor between the head and the body, and also an internal joint between the back of the skull and the neck vertebrae. These joints enabled the fish to open its jaws widely. It had a beak-like mouth, made of bony dental plates that were kept sharp by moving against each other (Benton and Sibbick, 1990). Coccosteus has been found in both marine and freshwater Devonian sediments in northern Europe, South Africa, and the United States, and in Lower Carboniferous sediments of Northern Ireland (Paleobiology Database, n.d.). Coccosteus cuspidatus fossils are fairly common in the Orcadian Basin of Scotland (Newman, 2010). The specimen shown here is from the Achanarras Quarry in Caithness, Scotland.

References:

Benton, M.J. and Sibbick, J. (1990) Vertebrate Palaeontology. Chichester, West Sussex: John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., p. 31.

Newman, M., (2010) Middle Devonian Fish from the Orcadian Basin of Scotland. International Palaeontological Congress 3 Pre-conference Field Trip, London, pp. 76-79.

Paleobiology Database (no date) Coccosteus, The Paleobiology Database. Available at: https://paleobiodb.org/classic/basicTaxonInfo?taxon_no=txn:209438 (Accessed: August 2024).