Ammonoids are extinct spiral shelled cephalopods comprising the subclass Ammonoidea. They are more closely related to living coleoids than they are to shelled nautiloids. The earliest ammonoids appeared during the Devonian, with the last species vanishing during or soon after the Cretaceous–Paleogene extinction event. They are often called ammonites, which is most frequently used for members of the order Ammonitida, the only remaining group of ammonoids from the Jurassic up until their extinction.
Goniatids, informally goniatites, are ammonoid cephalopods that form the order Goniatitida, derived from the more primitive Agoniatitida during the Middle Devonian some 390 million years ago. Goniatites (goniatitids) survived the Late Devonian extinction to flourish during the Carboniferous and Permian only to become extinct at the end of the Permian some 139 million years later.
Nautiloids are a group of marine cephalopods (Mollusca) which originated in the Late Cambrian and are represented today by the living Nautilus and Allonautilus. Fossil nautiloids are diverse and species rich, with over 2,500 recorded species. They flourished during the early Paleozoic era, when they constituted the main predatory animals. Early in their evolution, nautiloids developed an extraordinary diversity of shell shapes, including coiled morphologies and giant straight-shelled forms (orthocones). No orthoconic and only a handful of coiled species, the nautiluses, survive to the present day.
Septa are thin walls or partitions between the internal chambers (camerae) of the shell of a cephalopod, namely nautiloids or ammonoids.
Agathiceras is a subglobose goniatitid from the family Agathiceratidae, widespread and locally abundant in Lower Pennsylvanian to Middle Permian sediments, e.g. the Urals, Sicily, and Texas.
Alaoceras is an ammonoid cephalopod from the upper Paleozoic included in the goniatitid family Cravenoceratidae, named by Ruzhentsev & Bogoslovskaya in 1971.
Arctoceras is a genus of ceratitid ammonoids from the Lower Triassic with a moderately narrow discoidal shell and ceratitic suture.
Ceratitida is an order that contains almost all ammonoid cephalopod genera from the Triassic as well as ancestral forms from the Upper Permian, the exception being the phylloceratids which gave rise to the great diversity of post-Triassic ammonites.
Goniatitina is one of two suborders included in the order Goniatitida; extinct Paleozoic ammonoid cephalopods only distantly related to the Nautiloidea.
Pseudohaloritidae is the larger of two families that form the goniatitid superfamily Pseudohaloritoidea, the other being the monogenerc Maximitidae. They are part of the vast array of shelled cephalopods known as ammonoids that are more closely related to squids, belemnites, octopuses, and cuttlefish, than to the superficially similar Nautilus.
Gastrioceratoidea is one of 17 superfamilies in the suborder Goniatitina, ammonoid cephalopods from the Late Paleozoic.
Thalassoceratidae a family of late Paleozoic ammonites included in the goniatitid superfamily Thalassoceratoidea along with the Bisatoceratidae. Some eight genera are included, although the specific number and exactly which depends on the particular classification.
The Cravenoceratidae is one of six families included in the ammonoid superfamily Neoglyphioceratoidea, which lived during the latter part of the Paleozoic era.
Zetoceras is an extinct ammonoid cephalopod genus from the suborder Phylloceratina that lived during the Early and Middle Jurassic in what is now Europe, and is included in the (family) Phylloceratidae.
Prolecanitida is an order of extinct ammonoid cephalopods, the major Late Paleozoic group of ammonoids alongside the order Goniatitida. Prolecanitids had narrow shells, discoidal (disc-shaped) to thinly lenticular (lens-shaped). They retained a retrochoanitic siphuncle, a simple form with septal necks extending backwards. As is typical for ammonoids, the siphuncle sits along the ventral margin of the shell.
Prolecanitoidea is a taxonomic superfamily of ammonoids in the order Prolecanitida. Prolecanitoidea is one of two superfamilies in the order, along with the younger and more complex Medlicottioidea. The Prolecanitoidea were a low-diversity and morphologically conservative group. They lived from the Lower Carboniferous up to the Middle Permian. Their shells are generally smooth and discoidal, with a rounded lower edge, a moderate to large umbilicus, and goniatitic to ceratitic sutures. Suture complexity varies from 10 up to 22 total lobes ; new lobes are added from subdivision of saddles adjacent to the original main umbilical lobe.
Pachylyroceras is a large, generally subglobular, Upper Mississippian gonitite and included in the cephalopod subclass Ammonoidea.
Flemingites is an extinct genus of evolute ammonoid from the Smithian with spiral ridges on the shell.
Sturia is a genus of ceratitid ammonoids from the Lower Triassic with an ammonitic suture.
Choristoceratoidea, formerly Choristocerataceae, is a superfamily of Late Triassic ceratitid ammonites. They can be characterized by their simple, four-lobed suture lines and unusual heteromorph shell shapes, which can resemble straight rods or twisting cones rather than the flat coils typical of other ammonites. The shells are usually small and ornamented with prominent ribbing.
