''Tarsopterella'' is a genus of prehistoric

eurypterid Eurypterids, often informally called sea scorpions, are a group of extinct arthropods that form the Order (biology), order Eurypterida. The earliest known eurypterids date to the Darriwilian stage of the Ordovician period 467.3 Myr, million yea ...

classified within the family Hardieopteridae. It contains only one

species In biology, a species is the basic unit of classification and a taxonomic rank of an organism, as well as a unit of biodiversity. A species is often defined as the largest group of organisms in which any two individuals of the appropriate s ...

, ''T. scotica'' from the

Lower Devonian The Early Devonian is the first of three epochs comprising the Devonian period, corresponding to the Lower Devonian series. It lasted from and began with the Lochkovian Stage , which was followed by the Pragian from and then by the Emsian, w ...

Scotland Scotland (, ) is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. Covering the northern third of the island of Great Britain, mainland Scotland has a border with England to the southeast and is otherwise surrounded by the Atlantic Ocean to the ...

.Dunlop, J. A., Penney, D. & Jekel, D. 2015. A summary list of fossil spiders and their relatives. In World Spider Catalog. Natural History Museum Bern, online at http://wsc.nmbe.ch, version 16.0 http://www.wsc.nmbe.ch/resources/fossils/Fossils16.0.pdf (PDF).

Description

''Tarsopterella'' is distinguished by its prosoma (head), which is subrectangular and slightly concave in front, with small compound eyes. Its abdomen has pronounced lateral epimera (marginal spines similar to those of horseshoe crabs). ''Tarsopterella'' dates from the Lower Devonian period. 1955. Merostomata. ''Treatise on Invertebrate Paleontology, Part P Arthropoda 2, Chelicerata'', P38-P39.

References

Stylonurina Devonian eurypterids Prehistoric life of Europe Eurypterids of Europe {{Eurypterid-stub