Eldredgeops

Eldredgeops is a genus of trilobites in the order Phacopida, family Phacopidae, known from the late Middle and earliest Upper Devonian of Morocco and the USA. Like in all sighted Phacopina, the eyes of Phacops are compounded of very large (0.5mm in Eldredgeops rana), separately set lenses without a common cornea (so called schizochroal eyes), and like almost all other Phacopina, the articulate mid-length part of the body (or thorax) in Eldredgeops has 11 segments. Eldredgeops has a raised ridge along the ventral margin of the cephalon, the glabella is more inflated, the lateral parts of the preoccipital ring are rectangular (and not round), the palpebral area and palpebral lobe are larger than in P. latifrons, and there is no fold right behind the posterior vertical row of lenses nor an isolated raised area just below the lenses. Not all of these characteristics may differentiate among Eldredgeops and other Phacops species however. All phacopids died out in North-America during the Kačák Event at the end of the Eifelian. The phacopids return to North America during the early Givetian with the emigration of Eldredgeops species from Morocco. The species included in Eldredgeops were previously regarded as belonging to Phacops. It was considered however that the post-Eifelian North-American relatives of P. rana differ sufficiently from those found in Africa and Europe to be assigned to a separate genus. The new name is used for the North-American species as the type species Phacops latifrons is European. However, old combinations like Phacops rana are widely used among fossil collectors. Pre-Givetian North-American species previously included in Phacops have also been reassigned, such as P. cristatus (now referred to Viaphacops), P. microps and P. raymondi (now Kainops), P. cambelli, P. birdsongensis, P. claviger and P. logani (now Paciphacops).