A History of Ideas in Ichnology - Trace Fossils as Indicators of Sedimentary Environments - page 17

Russian scholars laid the groundwork for later scientific exploration by
beginning the process of documenting the ichnoheritage of Crimea, Ukraine,
and Caucasus. Among these early contributors, Bogatschev (1908) presented
“ Taonurus ” (now Spongeliomorpha ) from the Tertiary of Russia and eastern
Ukraine and questioned its algal origin. This hypothesis was supported by
Kryschtofowitsch (1911) , who interpreted Zoophycos from eastern Siberia as
a trace fossil. Despite these progressive explanations, fucoid and poriferan
interpretations were also common (e.g., Bogdanovich, Karakasch; Supplemen-
tary Material: http://booksite.elsevier.com/9780444538130 ).
In North America, James, working independently and in ignorance of
Nathorst, arrived at many of the same criteria that Nathorst used to criticize
the fucoid origins of many problematic fossils ( Osgood, 1975 ). With his restudy
of the systematics of Fucoides , Skolithos , and Arthrophycus , James can right-
fully be considered as the first ichnotaxonomist ( Pemberton et al., 2007 ). Still,
James did not prevail; his publications, though often prescient, were backward
in some respects and not widely available ( Osgood, 1970 ), and his neoichnolo-
gical comparisons, like Hitchcock's, were to freshwater and terrestrial animals
such as insect larvae. James' biographer wrote that it was a pity that such a
promising scientist had wasted so much time on the taxonomy of useless mate-
rial. Although momentum gathered for the ichnological interpretation of prob-
lematic structures (notably, with Matthew, Barbour, and Sarle), the fucoid
interpretation remained standard in North America until the 1920s and was
common even into the 1950s (e.g., Newberry, White; Supplementary Material:
http://booksite.elsevier.com/9780444538130 ) .
During the Period of Reaction, the ichnological heritage of southern Africa
began to be extensively explored. In these early days, Spirophyton was attrib-
uted to fucoids, inorganic processes, and impressions of seaweeds of screw-like
form. Its first ichnological interpretation was given almost half of a century later
( Du Toit, 1954 ).
8. DEVELOPMENT OF THE MODERN APPROACH
8.1 Decline of Ichnology
By challenging the long-standing belief in fucoids, Nathorst profoundly altered
the conceptual fabric that underlay the understanding of trace fossils. This trans-
formation operated at two levels: (1) Nathorst showed that neoichnology was
the key to understanding trace fossils, and (2) he dismissed the idea of fucoids.
The former level led to the creation of the first organized study of ichnology in
the Wadden Sea, which marked the start of the development of the Modern
Approach ( Osgood, 1970, 1975 ). The second fact caused a widespread crisis
in European ichnology, which represents the predominant context of this histor-
ical stage. For these reasons, we will start the discussion from the latter aspect.