Geological time scale

Time in million Era Period Important events/

of years physical and organic
Quaternary Recent \ Holocene
2.5 Pleistocene Glaciation
Pliocene Formation of Pacific
Tertiary mountain chain
Miocene Formation of Eurasian

Cenozoic
Mountain chain
Oligocene
67 Eocene
137 Mezozoic Cretaceous
Jurassic
Triassic
285 Permian Varistian mountains
Carboniferous Tropical coal
swamps,
Paleozoic

Devonian Caledonian mountains

Silurian
Ordovician
570 Cambrian
2600 Pre-Cambrian Extensive mountain
building, earliest
known life
4600 Azoic Formation of Earth’s
crust, hydrosphere,
atmosphere, no rocks
have been found