Nautilus praepompilius

Nautilus cookanum Temporal range: Eocene to Oligocene
Conservation status
Fossil
Scientific classification
Kingdom:	Animalia
Phylum:	Mollusca
Class:	Cephalopoda
Order:	Nautilida
Family:	Nautilidae
Genus:	Nautilus
Species:	N. praepompilius
Binomial name
†Nautilus praepompilius Shimansky, 1957

Nautilus praepompilius is an extinct species of nautilus. It lived during the late Eocene and Oligocene epochs. Fossil specimens have been uncovered from the Chegan Formation of Kazakhstan. N. praepompilius has been grouped into a single taxon together with extant species based on their shared shell characters. It is morphologically closest to N. pompilius, hence the name. The nepionic constriction shows that the hatching size was approximately 23 mm, close to that for N. pompilius (around 26 mm).

References

• Allonautilus: A new genus of living nautiloid cephalopod and its bearing on phylogeny of the Nautilida