The Paleozoic (meaning "time of ancient life") Era lasted which lasted from 541 to 252.

2 million years
ago, is the first of the three eras that form a part of the Phanerozoic Eon. It is also known as “The Age of
Trilobites”. It began with a sudden explosion in animal life and ended with the greatest mass extinction
known to man. It is believed that some 15, 000 species that evolved in the Paleozoic hence the name
age of trilobites.

The story of the earliest Paleozoic animals is one of life in the sea and the terrestrial environment was
also then barren of the simplest life-forms.

*It is divided into six periods:

1. Cambrian (541 to 485.4mya) – Most major animal groups appear

The name Cambrian was derived from Cambria, the Roman name for Wales, where rocks of this
age were first studied. This was the time when hard-shelled animals first appeared in great
numbers mainly because of the shallow seas that flooded the continents. Gondwana was also
formed neared the South Pole. An event popularly and scientifically known as “Cambrian
Explosion” was derived from the hypothesized explosion of diversity of life that occurred very
rapidly, but that this actually occurred is not a consensus among scientists. Many marine
metazoans having mineralized exoskeletons flourished in the Cambrian, including sponges,
corals, mollusks, echinoderms, bryozoans, brachiopods and arthropods.
Trilobites are an arthropod that dominated the Cambrian fossil records that actually attained
their peak number of families near the end of the Cambrian.
2. Ordovician (485.4 to 443.8mya) – Massive marine life diversification
The name Ordovician was derived from a Celtic tribe called the Ordovices. Because of
continental separation, the trilobites drifted apart and took on location-dependent forms. The
first planktonic graptolites evolved, and other graptolite species became extinct. Terrestrial
arthropod fossils occurred in Ordovician and most profound perhaps was the colonization of the
land.
Despite the appearance of coral fossils during this time, reef ecosystems were still dominated by
algae and sponges,and in some cases by bryozoans. There was also global reef collapse that
happened due to global disturbances. Sea level transgression persisted, causing the drowning of
almost the entire Gondwana craton. The oldest complete vertebrates which were jawless,
armored fish with large bony shields on the head, and small plate-like scales covering the tail
can also be found in the Ordovician fossils.
The Ordovician ended with a major extinction event that caused the demise of about 60% of the
marine genera. Cold climates with icebergs abounded.
3. Silurian (443.8 to 419.2mya) – Life gains a foothold on land
The name Silurian was from a Celtic tribe called the Silures. Sea levels rose as the climate
stabilized compared to the prior millions of years. Coral reefs made their first appearance and
expanded. Land plants evolved in the moist regions near the Equator. This was the period when
the first known freshwater fish as well as the first fish with jaws, which resulted from an
adaptation of an anterior gill arch first made their appearance.
4. Devonian (419.2 to 358.9mya) – “The Age of Fishes”; Colonization of the land
 The reef ecosystems saw new and more varied life forms and life achieved the critical event of
adapting to land. Two major clades of animal moved ashore and rapidly radiated. The first
tetrapods, or four legged land-living vertebrates, and the first arthropods colonized the land,
including wingless insects and the earliest arachnids. The primitive plants that gained a foothold
in Silurian developed into forests. The first insects, spiders, and tetrapods also evolved.
With the new formation of predators, trilobites continued to evolve their defensive strategies.
Later in the Devonian, the fishes were the only vertebrates and gave rise to all other vertebrate
lineages. The first sarcoterygiians, or the lob-finned fish, appeared whose descendants were the
first tetrapods that also evolved before by the Upper Devonian. The earliest known Hexapods
also first appeared in the Devonian fossil records. The increasing biomass of land plants and
higher oxygen levels by the end of the Devonian faciliated the adaption to terrestrial life of
herbivorous animals. Trilobites declined despite their evolved defensive strategies because of
the increasingly widespread and more skillful predators.
5. Carboniferous (358.9 to 298.9 mya) – “The Age of Plants”; Reptiles and the amniotic egg appear
The name Carboniferous came from the massive deposits of coal found in U.K. and Western
Europe. During this period, the continents below the equator still formed the supercontinent
Gondwana.
The early wingless insects in Devonian acquired wings and despite the appearance of seeds,
most plants in Carboniferous still continued to use spores for reproduction. The moist and
swampy environments of the Carboniferous enabled the Lycophytes that evolved during the late
Silurian to early Devonian to continue to diversify and flourish throughout the Carboniferous.
Calamites and ferns which appeared during the Devonian period also flourished in the
Carbiniferous. Reptiles first appeared in the Pennsylvanian, following the appearance of
amphibians in the Devonian. The amniote egg appears which caused the ancestors of birds,
mammals, and reptiles to be able to reproduce on land since the embryo no longer required an
acqeous environment.
6. Permian (298.9 to 252.2mya)
This is the last period of the Paleozoic Era. It was named by Sir Roderick Murchison in the 1840s.
It ended with the most extensive mass extinction event in Paleontology known as the Permian-
Triassic extinction event, which caused the demise of about 90% to 95% of marine organisms
and 70% of terrestrial organisms to go extinct.Life on land included a diversity of plants,
arthropods, amphibians and reptiles which were mainly synapids.
Towards the very end of the Permian the first archosaurs appear, the ancestors of the soon to
follow Triassic dinosaurs