Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • adjective Of, relating to, or being the period of geologic time from about 443 to 416 millions years ago, the third period of the Paleozoic Era. The Silurian Period is characterized by the development of jawed fishes, early invertebrate land animals, and land plants.
  • noun The Silurian Period.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • Of or belonging to the Silures, a people of ancient Britain, or their country.
  • In geology, of or pertaining to the Silurian. See II.
  • noun A name given by Murchison, in 1835, to a series of rocks the order of succession of which was first worked out by him in that part of England and Wales which was formerly inhabited by the Silures.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • noun The Silurian age.
  • adjective (Geol.) Of or pertaining to the country of the ancient Silures; -- a term applied to the earliest of the Paleozoic eras, and also to the strata of the era, because most plainly developed in that country.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • adjective geology Of a geologic period within the Paleozoic era; comprises the Llandovery, Wenlock, Ludlow and Pridoli epochs from about 439 to 409 million years ago.
  • adjective archaeology Of or related to the Silures, a pre-Roman British tribe.
  • proper noun geology The Silurian period.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • noun from 425 million to 405 million years ago; first air-breathing animals

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[From Latin Silures, an ancient people of southwest Wales, where the rocks were first identified.]

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