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This book is the first to collate all the information currently available on early Mesozoic tetrapods. There are chapters on the phylogeny of key vertebrate groups, a section dealing with the most significant fossiliferous assemblages worldwide, the final section looks at faunal turnover and the possibility of mass extinctions.
Part I. Phylogeny: Introduction; 1. Late Triassic and Jurassic amphibians; 2. The Lepidosauromorpha; 3. Late Triassic-Early Jurassic sphenodontians from China and the phylogeny of the Sphenodontia; 4. Marine members of the Sphenodontia; 5. Patterns of evolution in Mesozoic Crocodyliformes; 6. Sister-group relationships of mammals and transformations of diagnostic mammalian characters; Part II. Faunal Assemblages: Introduction; 7. A review of the British Middle Triassic tetrapod assemblages; 8. Small tetrapods from the Upper Triassic of the Richmond Basin, Virginia; 9. Microvertebrates from the Placerias Quarry; 10. Late Triassic microvertebrates from central Europe; 11. Assemblages of small tetrapods from British Late Triassic fissure deposits; 12. Ornithiscian dinosaurs from the Upper Triassic of the United States; 13. Early Jurassic small tetrapods from the McCoy Brook formation of Nova Scotia; 14. The small tetrapods of the Lower Lufeng Formation, Yunnan, China; 15. Assemblages of small tetrapods from the Early Jurassic of Britain; 16. A review of the Early Jurassic tetrapods from the Glen Canyon Group of the American Southwest; 17. An Early or Middle Jurassic tetrapod assemblage from the La Boca Formation, northeastern Mexico; 18. Middle Jurassic microvertebrate assemblages from the British Isles; 19. A new Bathonian microvertebrate locality in the English Midlands; Part III. Faunal Change: Introduction; 20. The chronology and biogeography of mammalian origins; 21. Biotic and climatic changes in the Carnian (Triassic) of Europe and adjacent areas; 22. Late Triassic to Middle Jurassic extinctions among continental tetrapods; 23. Comments on 'Late Triassic to Middle Jurassic extinctions among continental tetrapods'; 24. What was the tempo and mode of evolutionary change in the Late Triassic to Middle Jurassic?; 25. Field trip guide: field guide to three late Triassic tetrapod sites in Virginia and North Carolina.
...reviews and resolves a number of old questions...also explores unresolved topics and even raises several new questions. David Weishampel, Nature "...delves into an interval and a set of vertebrate species that is particularly relevant to the biodiversity of the modern world...as a manual to begin investigating the workings of the Late Triassic and Early Jurassic world, this is a good book." Science "The papers are wide-ranging, well illustrated, and authoritative, and the editors appear to have kept the authors tightly focused." E. Delson, Choice "The papers are wide-ranging, well illustrated, and authoritative, and the editors appear to have kept the authors tightly focused." E. Delson, Choice "...a comprehensive and integrated work...the book succeeds admirably, containing clear and concise reviews of the key areas and representing an excellent starting point for forays into the primary literature." Michael S.Y. Lee, TREE "...a beautifully produced and substantial book. Its contents are scholarly, enormously interesting, and on the whole clearly written...This book is a 'must' for any academic library harbouring any palaeontological pretensions." Ian Jenkins, Geological Magazine
