Description
- Ophiapetra – Brittle Star
- Jurassic Age
- Solnhofen Limestone
- Near Hienheim, Germany
- Overall size of the matrix measures approx. 2 3/8″ x 5 1/8″ and will come in the 5.25″ x 6.25″ Riker Mount with Label as Shown
- More Solnhofen Fossils for Sale
The Solnhofen Plattenkalk, or Solnhofen limestone, is a Jurassic Konservat-Lagerstätte that preserves a rare assemblage of fossilized organisms, including highly detailed imprints of soft bodied organisms such as sea jellies.
The most familiar fossils of the Solnhofen Plattenkalk include the early feathered theropod dinosaur Archaeopteryx preserved in such detail that they are among the most famous and most beautiful fossils in the world.
The Solnhofen beds lie in the German state of Bavaria (Bayern), halfway between Nuremberg (Nürnberg) and Munich (München) and were originally quarried as a source of Lithographic limestone.
During the Late Jurassic, this area was an archipelago at the edge of the Tethys Sea.
This included placid lagoons that had limited access to the open sea and where salinity rose high enough that the resulting brine could not support life.
