Introduction

The Messel Pit near Darmstadt reached fame for its extraordinarily well-preserved Eocene fossils from approximately 47 million years ago. After long years of uncertainty about its fate, the fossil site “Grube Messel” was in 1995 inscribed on the “UNESCO World Heritage List” for its exceptional significance to paleontology.

The Messel site was actively mined from 1886 to 1971 and it was long known that the bituminous shale contained fossils of various vertebrates, plants and insects. After the conclusion of industrial mining, private collectors intensely and successfully searched the oil shale in the abandoned mine for fossils. In the short time until 1974 - when the quarry was closed to the public and governing bodies began preparing to fill the Messel Pit with refuse – passionate private collectors excavated and prepared numerous spectacular fossils. They developed the special transfer-preparation method to protect the fossils from decay in the fragile and readily disintegrating oil shale and preserve them permanently. Thanks to the success of these collectors and the later excavation activities of various paleontology institutes and museums a lot of rare fossils in an exceptional state of preservation were unearthed. Complete, fully articulated skeletons of vertebrates, mothers with fetuses, gut contents and soft tissue preservation including hairs and feathers make Messel fossils unique amongst all fossil collections. They provide a unique insight into the flora and fauna of a tropical-subtropical landscape some 47 million years ago.

Most fossils pictured in these pages are originally from the collection of Otto Feist from Mühltal, Germany, gathered during his activities in the years 1972 to 1974.