Editor's note: This website was started when I was a geology student in college. My goal was to create a site that focused on geology, but fate had something else in store for this site. It was my chemistry section that drew the most interest and thus was where I focused most of my efforts. Eventually, for unrelated reasons, I changed majors and I'm afraid this timeline was my first and last foray into the geology direction.
| EON | ERA | PERIOD | EPOCH | DATES | AGE of | Notes | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Phanerozoic | Cenozoic | Quaternary | Holocene | 0-2 | Mammals | Humans | ||
| Pleistocene | ||||||||
| Tertiary | Neogene | Pliocene | 2-5 | |||||
| Miocene | 5-24 | |||||||
| Paleogene | Oligocene | 24-37 | ||||||
| Eocene | 37-58 | |||||||
| Paleocene | 58-66 | Extinction of dinosaurs | ||||||
| Mesozoic | Cretaceous | 66-144 | Reptiles | Flowering plants | ||||
| Jurassic | 144-208 | 1st birds & mammals | ||||||
| Triassic | 208-245 | First Dinosaurs | ||||||
| Paleozoic | Permian | 245-286 | Amphibians | End of trilobites | ||||
| Carboniferous | Pennsylvanian | 286-320 | First reptiles | |||||
| Mississippian | 320-360 | Large primitive trees | ||||||
| Devonian | 360-408 | Fishes | First amphibians | |||||
| Silurian | 408-438 | First land plant fossils | ||||||
| Ordovician | 438-505 | Invertebrates | First Fish | |||||
| Cambrian | 505-570 | 1st shells, trilobites dominant | ||||||
| Proterozoic | Also known as Precambrian | 570-2,500 | 1st Multi-celled organisms | |||||
| Archean | 2,500-3,800 | 1st one-celled organisms | ||||||
| Hadean | 3,800-4,600 | Approx age of oldest rocks 3,800 | ||||||
Reference: Graham R. Thompson, Jonathan Turk,
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Kenneth Barbalace. Geologic Time Scale. EnvironmentalChemistry.com. 1995 - 2024. Accessed on-line: 11/23/2024
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