Abstract Fossils were credited with magico-medicinal properties in lapidary books written from the second century BCE onwards. The analysis of historical references to fossils in these ancient literary, geological, medical and magical texts has been named Cryptopalaeontology, a discipline that also includes discoveries of fossils at archaeological sites and the study of oral traditions. Theophrastus’ Perì líthôn (third century BCE), the four apocryphal Greek lapidaries ( Líthica Orphéôs , Orphéôs Líthica Kêrygmata , Socrátous Dionísou perì líthôn and Damigeron–Evax : second century BCE), Pliny the Elder’s Historiae Naturae, Dioscorides’ De Materia Medica (first century CE), Isidore of Seville’s Etymologiarum (seventh century) and Alfonso X’s Libro de las Piedras (thirteenth century) all contain frequent references to fossils. In this context, these works might be considered the oldest treatises on fossils ever written. The talismanic use of most of these fossils against a wide range of diseases was based on sympathetic magic. Only a few (e.g. Lapis Gagates, amber and Lapis Bitumen) survive in recent pharmacopoeia.

Abstract The intra-Vendian (Ediacaran)–intra-Tremadocian succession of the Cadenas Ibéricas in NE Spain is divided into nine sequences. Overall, these are interpreted as second-order sequences. Those that encompass Lower and lower Middle Cambrian carbonates, with identified transgressive systems tract (TST) and highstand systems tract (HST) phases, may constitute elements of composite sequences. The lowermost sequence is of Late Vendian age. In Lower and lower Middle Cambrian units, sequence tops indicate drowning, reflecting extensional tectonics. Rifting effects are traceable up to mid-Mid Cambrian times. The remaining sequences probably represent a sag phase, either accentuating the preceding extensional local basin regime or heralding the Gondwana passive margin stage. Of the southerly Gondwana deposits those of other areas of the Iberian Peninsula and of the Moroccan Anti-Atlas fold belt show similar conditions during the Early Cambrian, that is, an Early Cambrian extensional regime, and, as for the Moroccan fold belt, four sequences imaging TST and HST phases.

Abstract The Iberian Peninsula has some of the most extensive Cambrian outcrops in Europe ( Lotze 1961 c ), including a diverse, continuous record of fossils and facies, and is thus a fundamental source of biostratigraphic information for the Cambrian System and its intercontinental correlations. Most exposures of Iberian Cambrian rocks occur in the Iberian Massif, but they are also known from the Pyrenees, the Catalonian Coastal Ranges and the Iberian Ranges (Fig. 3.1 ). Many exposures are geographically isolated and/or show tectonic boundaries, and facies changes are common, and these characteristics have led to a profuse stratigraphic nomenclature (see Fig. 3.2 ; Zamarreño 1983; Liñán et al . 1993 a ). Following Lotze (1961 c ), however, the Cambrian sequence can be overviewed as a diachronous Lower to Middle Cambrian carbonate sequence sandwiched by silici-clastic successions (Fig. 3.2 ). The lower of the siliciclastic units is entirely Lower Cambrian, whereas the upper unit ranges from upper Lower or Middle Cambrian to Upper Cambrian (Fig. 3.2 ). The Lower Cambrian series has been subdivided into the Corduban, Ovetian, Marianian and Bilbilian stages, and the Middle Cambrian series subdivided into the Leonian, Caesaraugustan and Languedocian stages (Fig. 3.2 ). The Precambrian/Cambrian boundary stratotype was erected by the International Subcommission on Cambrian Stratigraphy (ISCS) at the Fortune Head section in eastern Newfoundland (Canada) with the first appearance datum (FAD) of Phycodes (= Trichophycus) pedum ( Landing 1994 ). This FAD coincides with behavioural changes, increased