Phylogeny
Despite their rich fossil record with thousands of described genera found throughout the world, the taxonomy and phylogeny of trilobites have many uncertainties. Except possibly for the members of the orders Phacopida and Lichida (who first appear during the early Ordovician), nine of the eleven trilobite orders appear prior to the end of the Cambrian. Most scientists believe that order Redlichiida, more specifically its suborder Redlichiina, contains a common ancestor of all other orders, with the possible exception of the Agnostina. While many potential phylogenies are found in the literature, most have suborder Redlichiina giving rise to orders Corynexochida and Ptychopariida during the Lower Cambrian, and the Lichida descending from either the Redlichiida or Corynexochida in the Middle Cambrian. Order Ptychopariida is the most problematic order for trilobite classification. In the 1959 Treatise on Invertebrate Paleontology, what are now members of orders Ptychopariida, Asaphida, Proetida, and Harpetida were grouped together as order Ptychopariida; subclass Librostoma was erected in 1990 to encompass all of these orders, based on their shared ancestral character of a natant (unattached) hypostome. The most recently recognized of the nine trilobite orders, Harpetida, was erected in 2002. The progenitor of order Phacopida is unclear.
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