John C. W. Cope- BSc, PhD, DSc
- Research Associate at University of Bristol
John C. W. Cope
- BSc, PhD, DSc
- Research Associate at University of Bristol
Ordovician molluscs. Jurassic ammonites and stratigraphy
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197
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Introduction
John C. W. Cope is currently Research Associate in the School of Earth Sciences at the University of Bristol. John does research on Upper Jurassic ammonite faunas and Jurassic stratigraphy; Ordovician bivalves and other molluscs; Ediacaran faunas; the geology of Dorset and of south Devon.
Current institution
Additional affiliations
September 1989 - September 2003
September 1961 - September 1989
September 2003 - present
Education
April 1964 - January 1989
September 1959 - March 1964
October 1956 - June 1959
University of Bristol
Field of study
- Geology
Publications
Publications (197)
The Llangynog Inlier of south Wales contains an assemblage of Ediacaran macrofossils from a shallow-marine environment, including discoidal morphs of Aspidella and rare examples of Hiemalora , Palaeopascichnus and Yelovichnus . These are taxa found at other sites in the Avalonian microcontinent (e.g. Charnwood Forest and eastern Newfoundland) and i...
A low abundance but diverse fauna of tergomyan molluscs is described from the Llangynog Inlier, Carmarthenshire, South Wales. The specimens originate from a single quarry exposing shallow-water siltstone and mudstone beds of the Early Arenig (early Floian) Bolahaul Member of the Ogof Hên Formation. The fauna includes Proplina areniga sp. nov., Prop...
Biostratigraphy is the use of fossils to date and correlate rocks. It works because life on Earth is in constant flux and so any given time is characterised by unique combinations of organisms, and the rocks deposited at that time by their fossils. To enhance stratigraphical precision, biostratigraphy focuses on selected fossil bioevents in geologi...
Explains the evolution of Jurassic ammonoids, illustrated bya range-chart
Ammonites hitherto included in the species Aulacostephanus autissiodorensis in fact belong to two quite separate forms that as well as being readily distinguishable morphologically have different stratigraphical ranges. A new species, Aulacostephanus camericensis, is proposed for forms which are equicostate throughout and the name A. autissiodorens...
Ammonoidea are cephalopods that provide an exceptionally high-resolution marine biostratigraphic scale from Devonian through Cretaceous. In some stratigraphic intervals , such as across the JurassicÀCretaceous boundary, they displayed considerable endemism that is a challenge for interregional correlation.
A small bivalve fauna is described from the late Tremadocian of Iran, adding to the very few localities in the world where bivalves of this age are known. In addition to indeterminate praenuculids, the fauna includes the praenuculid Pensarnia and the pteriomorphian genus Glyptarca. The former is otherwise known from South Wales and the latter, from...
During the period from 1962 to 1973 Raymond Casey produced several ground-breaking papers on the Upper Jurassic of eastern England. These included the recognition that genera, previously thought to be of Early Cretaceous age, were in fact of latest Jurassic age. This led him to produce new correlations with the latest Jurassic of southern England,...
Background:
Globally, >300 million patients have surgery annually, and ≤20% experience adverse postoperative events. We studied the impact of both cardiac and noncardiac adverse events on 1-year disability-free survival after noncardiac surgery.
Methods:
We used the study cohort from the Evaluation of Nitrous oxide in Gas Mixture of Anesthesia (...
The Geological Survey’s Framework Report on the Old Red Sandstone of the Anglo-Welsh region includes a proposal for a new formational name, the Cwmffrwd Formation, for the basal formation of the Daugleddau Group in Carmarthenshire, S. Wales. The name is preoccupied by the Early Ordovician Cwmffrwd Member of the Carmarthen Formation and
a new name,...
Background As global initiatives increase patient access to surgical treatments, there remains a need to understand the adverse effects of surgery and define appropriate levels of perioperative care. Methods We designed a prospective international 7-day cohort study of outcomes following elective adult inpatient surgery in 27 countries. The primary...
A collection of papers, mostly from amongst those presented to an international meeting held in Sherborne, Dorset, UK, at the end of September 2015 is published as a memorial to Professor John H. Callomon, a physical chemist, who gained a worldwide reputation amongst the palaeontological community for his fundamental contributions to sexual dimorph...
The upper part of the Helmsdale Boulder Beds Formation at Helmsdale, NE Scotland has yielded ammonites belonging to the genus Virgatopavlovia Cope, 1978. This genus is restricted to the youngest Bolonian Fittoni Zone that has hitherto not been recorded on the basis of its ammonite fauna outside of south Dorset. Palaeogeographical reconstructions su...
The higher parts of the cores of the Swanworth Boreholes, Dorset, allow detailed investigation of parts of the Upper Jurassic Kimmeridge Clay Formation that are difficult to sample on the coastal type-section. The member-level divisions set up by Buckman and Arkell are confirmed as readily recognisable. Body-fossils have been found throughout the b...
Until recently exhumation of much of the southern British Isles, outside of the area of well-documented Neogene folding in south-eastern parts of England has been ascribed to large-scale early Palaeogene erosion following igneous underplating in the Irish Sea and surrounding areas during the early Cenozoic. Recent publications have, however, identi...
Procedures used to define an international chronostratigraphic stage boundary and to locate and ratify a Global Boundary Stratotype Section and Point (GSSP) are outlined. A majority of current GSSPs use biostratigraphic data as primary markers with no reference to any physico-chemical markers, despite the International Subcommission on Stratigraphi...
An account is given of a Geologists’ Association meeting in the Isle of Purbeck held on 28th–30th September 2012 and the stratigraphy and structures of the rocks examined during the weekend are described. Uppermost Jurassic Stage nomenclature and recent changes to stratigraphical nomenclature in the uppermost part of the Kimmeridge Clay Formation a...
Following the ratification of the Tithonian Stage as the Primary Standard Stage for the terminal Jurassic, the Kimmeridgian Stage can only be used in its shorter sense. For those areas of north-western Europe including Britain, where ammonite provinciality precludes use of the Tithonian Stage, the Secondary Standard Stages Bolonian and Portlandian...
Bivalves first appeared in the Early Cambrian and were virtually cosmopolitan. These very small and insignificant molluscs were probably surface crawlers on the microbial mat floors of the Cambrian sea. They evolved little further in the Mid Cambrian and by the Late Cambrian had apparently disappeared from the fossil record. Their re-appearance in...
The ‘Tertiary’, omitted from IUGS-approved timescales since 1989, is still in common use. With the recent re-instatement of the Quaternary as a formal unit, the question arises as to whether the Tertiary too should be reinstated as a formal period, with the ‘Paleogene’ and ‘Neogene’ being downgraded to sub-periods. This paper presents arguments for...
The following classification summarizes the suprageneric taxonomy
of the Bivalvia for the upcoming revision of the Bivalvia
volumes of the Treatise on Invertebrate Paleontology, Part N. The development
of this classification began with Carter (1990), Campbell,
Hoekstra, and Carter (1995, 1998), Campbell (2000, 2003), and
Carter, Campbell, and Campb...
A scheme of grouped lithostratigraphical units (‘beds’) proposed for the English Upper Jurassic Kimmeridge Clay Formation has been claimed to be also chronostratigraphical, but some of the resulting time-correlations conflict with those of the standard chronozonation based on ammonite biostratigraphy. Review of some critical ammonite species reaffi...
The four poorly known Ordovician bivalve genera erected by Guo (1988) from the Lower Ordovician (Floian) Hongshiya Formation of East Yunnan, China are redescribed, based on a re-examination of the type material, and their taxonomic position is clarified. This paper places the four genera in the superfamily Cycloconchoidea. Reinterpretation of the h...
Jonathan Radley writes: The Penarth Group (of Late Triassic and possibly ranging to Early Jurassic age) of the southern UK marks a marine transgression and the establishment of a shallow epicontinental seaway (Hallam & El Shaarawy 1982; Warrington & Ivimey-Cook 1992), influenced by regressive–transgressive pulses and characterized by rapid facies c...
The first System boundaries were based on lithostratigraphical criteria — the junction between two formations. As biostratigraphy and chronostratigraphy developed, ammonite faunas were used in the Mesozoic to define stages and form the basis of most zonal schemes. In the uppermost Jurassic and lowermost Cretaceous, this process is complicated by ex...
Investigations around Orleigh Court, south of Bideford, have established that the Eocene flint gravels are overlain by a series of clays and silts of probable Late Palaeogene age. The sole outcrop known hitherto is diminutive, but present topography suggests that it is an erosional remnant of a much larger basin formed along part of the Sticklepath...
A lappeted microconch specimen of the phylloceratid ammonoid Juraphyllites from the Tethyan Jurassic of Anatolia (Turkey) indicates that sexual dimorphism in this group was established as early as in the early Lower Pliensbachian (Lower Jurassic) and that dimorphism in this genus of the Phylloceratina follows the same pattern as that proven [or man...
The Upper Cretaceous sub-Period saw the deposition of the Chalk over much of the British Isles region, with progressively inundated land areas. By the Late Maastrichtian land areas were at their minimum and a thick Chalk sequence accumulated over the region. In the Early Palaeocene uplift in the Irish Sea interrupted deposition, but in many areas m...
Problematical discoid fossils from the Lower Arenig (Moridunian Stage) of the Llangynog Inlier, South Wales, are interpreted as parablastoid holdfasts. They constitute the first record of holdfasts in this rare echinoderm class. The lower surface has a radial ribbed structure, in contrast to the concentric, reticulate structure of the upper surface...
Octocorallian and hydroid fossils are described from the Lower Ordovician (Arenig Series) of Wales. They include gorgoniids that are the earliest known fossils of this group: Petilavenula varifurcata gen. et sp. nov. and P. surculosa gen. et sp. nov. Pennalina crossi gen. et sp. nov. is probably also a gorgoniid but may be a hydroid. A new hydroi...
Gibbard, P. L., Smith, A. G., Zalasiewicz, J. A., Barry, T. L., Cantrill, D., Coe, A. L., Cope, J. C. W., Gale, A. S., Gregory, F. J., Powell, J. H., Rawson, P. F., Stone, P. & Waters, C. N. 2005 (February): What status for the Quaternary?Boreas, Vol. 34, pp. 1–6. Oslo. ISSN 0300–9483.
The status of the Quaternary, long regarded as a geological per...
A bivalve fauna of Early Ordovician (late Arenig) age is described from the Hsiangyang Formation of the eastern part of West Yunnan, China. The fauna contains elements in common with Early Ordovician faunas of southern Gondwanan areas such as the Montagne Noire and Morocco and with those of Avalonia, together with several previously undescribed tax...
The post-Variscan history of south-west England may be pieced together by using evidence provided by a series of outliers of rocks that indicate former extensive outcrops, and from derived materials in coarse clastic rocks. Other evidence may be deduced from the outcrop pattern of the area, that indicates areas of extensive post-Variscan folding an...
The first middle Ordovician bivalve fauna to be described from Britain is from the lower part of the Didymograptus murchisoni Biozone of the Llanvirn Series of the Builth-Llandrindod Wells Inlier of mid-Wales. The fauna is preserved in a close inshore facies that accumulated locally around volcanic islands and is incorporated in bivalve-dominated s...
Previously known only from the Middle Ordovician of the Baltic, Pollicina corniculum (Eichwald) is reported here from the Middle Ordovician of Wales and the Welsh Borderland. A review of the taxonomic position of Pollicina in the light of this new material combined with the recent redescription of the Russian type material suggests that it is best...
The rostroconch mollusc Eopteria aiteneria sp. nov. is described from the Late Ordovician Angrensor Formation of north-eastern Central Kazakhstan; it is the first and only known representative of this group from the Ordovician of central Asia. By the beginning of the Late Ordovician Eopteria and the family Eopteriidae were on the verge of extinctio...
Bivalves have a wide distribution in the Lower and to a lesser extent Middle Cambrian rocks, but they have not yet been certainly identified in the Upper Cambrian. Recent discoveries have significantly increased our knowledge of Lower Ordovician bivalve faunas and their explosive radiation from the Early Ordovician apparently coincides with the evo...
The discovery of an arietitid ammonite (Bucklandi Zone), with evidence for the timing of its emplacement into Pleistocene deposits soon after oxygen isotope sub-stage 5e (5.5), is used to infer that the coastal plateau immediately north of Horton, Port Eynon Bay, is approximately coincident with an exhumed sub-Mesozoic surface. A resistivity survey...
In the 30 years since publication of the bivalve Treatise , (Moore, R. C. (ed.) 1969. Treatise on Invertebrate Paleontology. Part N. Mollusca 6, Bivalvia , Geological Society of America and University of Kansas) important new faunas have been described from the early and mid Cambrian and from the early and mid Ordovician. These contain significant...
Bivalves: An Eon of Evolution. Paleobiological Studies Honoring Norman D. Newell, Paul A. Johnston and James W. Haggart (Editors), 1998, University of Calgary Press, Alberta, xiv + 461 p. (Hardcover $59.95) ISBN 1-55238-005-X; (Softcover $44.95) ISBN 1-55238-004-1.
This collection of 30 papers on bivalves is centered around the papers presented at...
All but one of the papers in this thematic set derive from papers presented to the 1998 Lyell Meeting convened by John Cope and Charles Curtis under the auspices of the Joint Committee for Palaeontology, held in the Society's apartments in February of that year. We are pleased to acknowledge the financial contributions made to this meeting by the G...
The occurrence of ammonite jaw apparatuses in situ within concretions from the Sinemurian (Lower Jurassic) of Black Ven Cliff, Charmouth, Dorset, provides evidence of burial of the ammonites with soft parts intact and this is of importance in considering the origin of the concretions. The lower jaws (anaptychi) of arietitid and eoderoceratid ammoni...
Ammonites from different localities and horizons within the Lower Lias of Dorset record a complex diagenetic history preserved in carbonate cements within their body chambers. The studied ammonites are commonly preserved uncrushed in thinly bedded (0.001 m) peloidal sediments associated with small-scale upward fining couplets. The body chambers of...
The Ordovician was the most significant Period in bivalve diversification. From a small Cambrianstock of palaeotaxodonts, the most fundamental radiation occurred in the early Ordovician. An intrinsic factor was the most significant, involving the evolution of the feeding gill within the palaeotaxodonts. This fundamental morphological change allowed...
The arcoidean bivalves, Trecanolia acincta gen. et sp. nov. and Uskardita mikraulax gen. et sp. nov., are described from the Wenlock of South Wales. These bivalves are accommodated within the new family Frejidae, alongside the closely related Silurian genera Freja Liljedahl and Alytodonta Cope. The frejids are characterized by an amphidetic, chevro...
A new alga, Arenigiphyllum crustosum gen. et sp. nov., from the lower Ordovician (lower Arenig Series, Moridunian Stage) of the Llangynog Inlier, Carmarthenshire, Wales, has a thin crustose dorsiventral thallus. The single specimen is preserved as limonite. Construction is dimerous, consisting of juxtaposed vertical filaments arising from prostrate...
A new alga, Arenigiphyllum crustosum gen. et sp. nov., from the lower Ordovician (lower Arenig Series, Moridunian Stage) of the Llangynog Inlier, Carmarthenshire, Wales, has a thin crustose dorsiventral thallus. The single specimen is preserved as limonite. Construction is dimerous, consisting of juxtaposed vertical filaments arising from prostrate...
Microfossils obtained from dissolution of a limestone horizon from the lower Cambrian Allt y Shed Sandstone of the Llangynog Inlier, Carmarthenshire, South Wales, are identified as agglutinated foraminiferans. Two genera and three species are represented and are figured. These microfossils add further to the scanty record of Cambrian foraminiferans...
Catamarcaia, described from the mid-Arenig of Argentina as a pteriomorphian bivalve with palaeoheterodont affinities by Sánchez & Babin (1993), has a morphology which allows it to be interpreted as the earliest known member of the Subclass Neotaxodonta. In turn this indicates that the origin of the Pteriomorphia was from the Neotaxodonta, rather th...
Differences between zoologists and palaeontologists over high-level bivalve taxonomy reflect the hitherto poorly understood early phylogeny of the class Bivalvia. Recent description of a diverse early Arenig fauna and recognition that explosive radiation of early Ordovician bivalves can be correlated with evolution of the filibranch gill within the...
