Palaeontology Collection
The Sedgwick Museum’s Palaeontology Collections comprise over a million individual fossils, including over 9,000 primary types and 32,000 figured and cited specimens. The collections are taxonomically comprehensive and international in scope.
Palaeontology Collections Overview
The collections support palaeontological and biostratigraphical research on an international scale. Many of the collections are of historic significance and are of interest to those working in the field of the history and philosophy of science. The main historic collections are summarised by collector/donor in Cleevely (1983).
About 77% of catalogued collections are from the UK. They include material collected from most significant UK stratigraphic units and are particularly strong on material from the East of England. 12% are from the rest of Europe, 4% from North America, 2% each from Africa and Asia, and 1% each from Australasia and South America.
A large amount of undocumented material is available for identification and further investigation.
The collections are continuously developed through the research efforts of the academic staff and research students of the University of Cambridge and its partner institutions.
Photographs and 3D models of many of our UK type fossils can be found on the GB3D Type Fossils site.
Additional fossils may be found within the Woodwardian Collection and Svalbard Collection.
The Museum Archive offers additional opportunities to explore the field data, catalogues and correspondence relating to these collections.
The collections are split between the Sedgwick Museum Building on Downing Street in Central Cambridge and the Collections Research Centre on Madingley Rise in West Cambridge. Please make sure that your requirements are clear before visiting and that you allow time to visit both sites, if necessary.
Vertebrates
A large collection of UK Mesozoic marine reptiles, including ichthyosaurs purchased from famed fossil collector Mary Anning, attracts significant research interest. Other important collections include pterosaurs from the Cenomanian Cambridge Greensand, Pleistocene mammals, Fenland peat-bog material, UK dinosaur remains and a diverse assemblage of fossil fish. All human osteological remains have been transferred to the Duckworth Laboratory. The Museum still houses a small collection of around 750 flint artefacts. Larger archaeological collections may be found at the Museum of Archaeological and Anthropology.
Invertebrates and trace fossils
The Museum holds a diverse collection of invertebrates and trace fossils, spanning multiple taxa, stratigraphic units and localities. This includes large collections that reflect the research activities of teams that have worked on specific taxonomic groups in the past e.g. graptolites (G.L. Elles (1872-1960), O.M.B. Bulman (1902-1974), B. Rickards (1938-2009) and trilobites (H.B. Whittington (1916-2010)). Recent acquisitions include Inferior Oolite ammonites donated by R.B. Chandler and casts of Newfoundland Ediacaran biota from A. Liu & E. Mitchell.
Palaeobotany
The palaeobotany collection comprises about 8,500 catalogued specimens and a large amount of uncatalogued material, including specimens transferred from the University of Cambridge Department of Botany (now Department of Plant Sciences) in the mid-20th century.
Palaeozoic material comprises about 5,000 catalogued specimens, predominantly from UK Carboniferous ‘Coal Measures’, but also including material from the Devonian Rhynie Chert of Scotland.
Mesozoic collections comprise about 2,000 catalogued specimens. The majority from the Triassic of Worcestershire and Nottinghamshire, Jurassic of Yorkshire and Sutherland Scotland and the Cretaceous of Sussex and the Isle of Wight.
Quaternary material Includes specimens from Barnwell, Cambridgeshire.
International collections include Miocene material from Oeningen Germany, Geneva Switzerland and Colorado USA, as well as Carboniferous ‘Mazon Creek’ sideritic nodules from the Francis Creek Shale Member, Carbondale Formation of Illinois USA.
Palaeobotanical material transferred from the Department of Botany Museum includes the collection of Sir Charles James Fox Bunbury (1809-1886) including many type specimens. It also includes coal ball specimens from Walter Hemingway (1859-1947) that were used by Hemingway to produce many of the thin sections sold through his microscope slide making business and now to be found in other institutions.
Micropalaeontology
The main micropalaeontology collections relate to research groups run by N.F. Hughes (1918-1994) who worked in the field of palynology and M.B. Black (1904-1973) a carbonate sedimentologist who worked on coccoliths and other microfossils.
The palynological collection comprises a large number of slides, SEM stubs, and core sample hand specimens and their processed residues. Much of the microfossil collection is housed in cavity slides. Around 100,000 electron micrographs on film and glass plates also form part of the collections. Some of these may be type specimens since some of Black’s EM work involved the destruction of the original specimens. Other major microfossil collections include bryozoans from the collection of R.M. Brydone (1873-1943) and foraminiferans from the collection of W.A. Macfadyen (1893-1985).
To obtain more information about using these collections for research and study purposes, please contact our Collection Team via the Research Enquiries page.