The city centre of Inverness, Scotland, is known for its rich history and quaint charm. But recently, it has given its residents and visitors a surprise from another era. A National Trust of Scotland (NTS) museum officer named James Ryan has discovered fossils that are nearly 390 million years old. The fossils belong to a class of bony fish called placoderms that lived during the Devonian period. The discovery has not only excited paleontologists, but also raised many questions about the marine fauna of that time and the geological history of the region.
It all started innocuously. As James Ryan was walking near Inverness Town House, he noticed dark spots in the paving slab he was walking on. Ryan already had some knowledge of fossils, so he quickly realised that these features were in fact large fins and scales of bony fish that were common in the Devonian period. “These fossils in the paving slab are the remains of ancient fish that are about 385 million years old, which is about 140 million years before the first dinosaur,” he told the BBC. As a history and fossil enthusiast, the NTS employee decided to report them to a palaeontologist to identify exactly what type of fish they were.
How can fish fossils end up in the middle of a city? According to James Ryan, a specialist in the famous (…)
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