History
The term was coined by Charles Darwin in his On the Origin of Species, when discussing Ornithorhynchus (the platypus) and Lepidosiren (the South American lungfish):
| “ | ... All fresh-water basins, taken together, make a small area compared with that of the sea or of the land; and, consequently, the competition between fresh-water productions will have been less severe than elsewhere; new forms will have been more slowly formed, and old forms more slowly exterminated. And it is in fresh water that we find seven genera of Ganoid fishes, remnants of a once preponderant order: and in fresh water we find some of the most anomalous forms now known in the world, as the Ornithorhynchus and Lepidosiren, which, like fossils, connect to a certain extent orders now widely separated in the natural scale. These anomalous forms may almost be called living fossils; they have endured to the present day, from having inhabited a confined area, and from having thus been exposed to less severe competition. | ” |
| — Charles Darwin, On the Origin of Species, p49 |
Read more about this topic: Living Fossil
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