Coldham Common, Barnwell (Cretaceous of the United Kingdom)

Where: England, United Kingdom (52.2° N, 0.2° E: paleocoordinates 40.6° N, 2.8° E)

• coordinate based on nearby landmark

• local area-level geographic resolution

When: Cambridge Greensand Member (West Melbury Marly Chalk Formation), Late/Upper Albian (105.3 - 99.6 Ma)

• Remanie fauna - reworked from late Albian into early Cenomanian deposits. Faunal assemblage is late Albian in age (age used here). "Although the deposit itself is generally considered to be of late Cretaceous, Cenomanian age, its macrofossil assemblage is thought to be derived largely from the underlying early Cretaceous, Albian, Gault Formation, on the basis of derived ammonites associated with the vertebrate fossils. An early Cenomanian age for deposition of the Cambridge Greensand is based on an apparently autochthonous foraminiferan assemblage, but Morter and Wood (1983) could not rule out the possibility of a very late Albian age due to the presence of the bivalve Aucinella. The age of the derived vertebrates is now considered to be no older than the Callihoplites auritus ammonite subzone and most likely no younger than upper Stoliczkaia dispar Zone, and they are thus of late Albian age." (Martill & Unwin 2011, Cretaceous Research, 10.1016/j.cretres.2011.09.003).

• member-level stratigraphic resolution

Environment/lithology: open shallow subtidal; lag, glauconitic, micaceous, nodular, phosphatic, green, silty marl

• "deeper phosphatic washings"

Size classes: macrofossils, mesofossils

Preservation: replaced with phosphate

Collected by P. Brodie, J. Carter

Collection methods: salvage,

• CAMSM: Sedgwick Museum, Cambridge

Primary reference: R. Owen. 1851. Monograph on the fossil Reptilia of the Cretaceous Formations. Part I. Chelonia (Lacertilia, etc.). The Palaeontographical Society, London 1851:1-118 [M. Carrano/M. Carrano/R. Benson]more details

Purpose of describing collection: taxonomic analysis

PaleoDB collection 45880: authorized by Matthew Carrano, entered by Matthew Carrano on 10.12.2004, edited by Richard Butler and Roger Benson

Creative Commons license: CC BY (attribution)

Taxonomic list

Reptilia
 Saurischia -
Macrurosaurus semnus n. gen. n. sp.
Macrurosaurus semnus n. gen. n. sp. Seeley 1869 sauropod
vertebrae supposedly the same individual; BMNH B55630–55652
 Pterosauria -
Pterodactyloidea indet. pterosaur
CAMSM "Series 1"
 Plesiosauria -
Polyptychodon interruptus Owen 1841 plesiosaur
large tooth discovered by Rev. Peter Brodie at Barnwell; tooth discovered by J. Carter