SOLD ! Cufflinks set in silver with fossils called Trilobites

The trilobite “elrathia kingi” from Millard County, Utah USA  silver cufflinks.  Unique and unusual gift for the man who has everything!

History

Trilobites existed for nearly 270 million years. Actually, not only did they exist… for the majority of their lengthy stay on Planet Earth, they thrived. These ancient arthropods filled the world’s oceans from the earliest stages of the Cambrian Period, 521 million years ago, until their eventual demise at the end of the Permian, 252 million years ago, a time when nearly 90 percent of life on earth was rather suddenly eradicated. That cataclysmic event, the largest mass die-off in planetary history, has become fittingly known as the Great Permian Extinction, and also happens to serve as the end line for the entire Paleozoic era.
Trilobites evolved continually throughout their incredibly long march through “deep time” history. During that extended stay they inhabited virtually every available aquatic niche and eventually produced over 25,000 species that displayed a startlingly diverse array of sizes, shapes and surface ornamentations. Quite simply, by any measurable criterion, trilobites rank among the most successful creatures ever to exist on our world.
To put the trilobites’ mind-boggling longevity into some kind of paleontological perspective, their reign lasted twice as long as that of the hallowed dinosaurs and more than a thousand times longer than our own human species has so-far managed to survive. Yet, despite their durability and obvious skill for adapting to ever-changing ecological conditions, it is now known that trilobites suffered a slow yet steady decline before eventually succumbing to a variety of environmental pressures.