The Geologic Column

  • 11,477 BCE

    Era

    Era
    Cenozoic: end of last Ice Age; rise of human civilization
  • mesozoic

    mesozoic
    mass extintions (including dinosaurs); flowering plants appear
  • quanternary

    quanternary
    recent (heolocene) Epoch
    plistocene Epoch
  • proterozoic

    simple multicelular sea creatures develop
  • Paleozoic

    Paleozoic
    modern insect; reptiles spread; evergreens
  • pennsylvanian

    pennsylvanian
    giant insects; first reptiles
  • mississippian

    mississippian
    amphibians spread; sharks and bony fish; winged insects
  • Devonian

    Devonian
    first amphibians;fresh wáter fish; wingless insects
  • Silurian

    Silurian
    land colonized by anthropods and plants
  • Ordovician

    Ordovician
    trilobites abundant; vertebrates increase
  • cambrian

    cambrian
    sudden explosión of life; tribolites dominant; rise of other marine invertebrates; some vertebrates
  • tertiary

    tertiary
    pilociene epoch
    miocene epoch
    oligocene epoch
    eocene epoch
    paleocene epoch