On Friday this week (28^th September) I will be helping to clean one of the largest, and to my mind most impressive, specimens on display in UCL’s Rock Room – the 243 million year old footprint of a mammal-like reptile (but definitely NOT a dinosaur) called Chirotherium. I say definitely not a dinosaur because I’ve made this rather embarrassing geological/ zoological mistake a couple of times and been told off for it.

As the footprint is displayed in its own (heavy) glass it has taken more planning than you would have thought is required just to clean a specimen. In honour of this I have decided to write my first Geology blog on the subject.

Chirotherium footprint on display in the Rock Room

The Chirotherium lived during the Triassic Period, 248 – 206 million years ago, when most of the land on earth formed the super continent Pangaea. Its track prints have been known about since 1834, when examples were found in the German central state of Thuringia, however they have since been found across Europe, North America and parts of Africa.
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