【Introduction】

   This book record one of the most amazing finds in the 20th century the find of the Chengjiang fauna in true and detail. It has more than 200 kinds firs hand precious pictures of fossil, and provides their Chinese names, Latin names, Locality. It reappears the wonderful spectacles about the life of marine animals and the original characteristics of the existing living beings on the earth from 530 million years ago. It provides precious materials for enriching the theory of evolution.

The Cambrian represents the beginning of a long sequence of geological time known collectively as the Phanerozoic. This term is composed of the Greek words planners, meaning visible, obvious, and Zion, animal. This was to stress the difference from the older, once seemingly unfossiliferous Precambrian rocks, the Cryptozoic.

Although both microfossils and macrofossils are now known from Precambrian rocks, particularly from late Precambrian, there is the striking difference in numbers and types of fossils with those in the Phanerozoic. However, the situation varies in detail. In some areas Cambrian rocks may contain many fossils, whereas in others there are sandstone's or other rocks that are commonly poorly fossiliferous. In addition, different fossils occur in the Cambian in different parts of the world, which makes it difficult when making comparisons to know if we are talking about strata of exactly the same age.

【Main Contents】

1.Division of geological time
2.Evolution of Early Life on Earth
3.Cambrian and the Cambrian Explosion
4.Discovery and study of the Chengjiang Fauna
5.Distribution and Geological Setting of the Chengjiang fauna
6.Stratugraphy across the Precambrian-Cambruan Boundary
7.Significance of the Chengjiang fauna
8.Characterustucs of the Chengjiang fauna
9.Systematic Palaeontology of the Chengjiang Fauna
10.Phylum Echinodermata Klein,1734
11.Uncertain taxa