Early tetrapod
Acanthostega
Acanthostega had limbs with eight digits and a tail adapted to life in water.
Acanthostega had limbs with eight digits and a tail adapted to life in water. It belongs near a crucial early part of the history of limbed vertebrates.
Three stages. One companion.
Game artwork
AI-generated, stylized game illustrations. These designs and growth stages are imaginative, not scientific reconstructions.
Acanthostega at a glance
- Diet
- Carnivore
- Its feeding structures are interpreted as adapted to taking animal prey.
- When it lived
- Late Devonian
- Group
- Acanthostegidae
- Acanthostegidae
Beyond the game
The real Acanthostega
Acanthostega had limbs with eight digits and a tail adapted to life in water. It belongs near a crucial early part of the history of limbed vertebrates.
Its limbs show that fingers appeared before the familiar walking abilities of living land tetrapods. Aquatic features remained important parts of its body plan.
Fossil discoveries
Selected fossil records · present-day map
Map references
Map: Natural Earth, public domain. Fossil records: Paleobiology Database and linked collections and publications.Sources & text credits
Explore the references behind this profile.
- Polydactyly in the earliest known tetrapod limbs
- Paleobiology Database: Acanthostega gunnari (txn:227000)
Original English Dinosgacha summaries informed by the linked scientific and museum references; source publications retain their own rights.