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Platyrhinops (Amphibamus) lyelli, early amphibian skeleton

Amphibians, familiar to most people as frogs, toads, and salamanders, first appeared at the end of the Devonian Period. A notable Pennsylvanian locality is known as Linton, in Jefferson County, Ohio. Waste rock from a coal mine active in the 1800s, represents sediment deposited in a coal-swamp lake, perhaps an oxbow lake, that teemed with fishes, including paleoniscoids, lungfishes, and freshwater sharks, and many species of amphibians and even early reptiles. At least 22 species of amphibians are known from Linton. Most were small, aquatic forms. One frog-like form, Amphibamus lyelli, probably was primarily terrestrial. A more recently discovered locality in a strip mine in Mahoning County has yielded 13 species of amphibians, most of which are known also from Linton. Pennsylvanian non-marine rocks have yielded occasional footprints and trackways of amphibians.

Amphibamus was renamed Platyrhinops lyelli (Wyman) Clack & Milner, 1994