The Eckfelder Maar is a former

volcanic A volcano is a rupture in the crust of a planetary-mass object, such as Earth, that allows hot lava, volcanic ash, and gases to escape from a magma chamber below the surface. On Earth, volcanoes are most often found where tectonic plates are ...

lake, that was formed during the Middle

Eocene The Eocene ( ) Epoch is a geological epoch that lasted from about 56 to 33.9 million years ago (mya). It is the second epoch of the Paleogene Period in the modern Cenozoic Era. The name ''Eocene'' comes from the Ancient Greek (''ēṓs'', "daw ...

around 44.3 million years ago and is thus the oldest known maar. It lies in the southwestern

Eifel The Eifel (; lb, Äifel, ) is a low mountain range in western Germany and eastern Belgium. It occupies parts of southwestern North Rhine-Westphalia, northwestern Rhineland-Palatinate and the southern area of the German-speaking Community of ...

mountains near Manderscheid in Germany.''Das Eckfelder Maar''
at www.eckfelder-maar.de. Retrieved 22 Jul 2016. It is also an important

fossil A fossil (from Classical Latin , ) is any preserved remains, impression, or trace of any once-living thing from a past geological age. Examples include bones, shells, exoskeletons, stone imprints of animals or microbes, objects preserved in ...

site that contains numerous fossil remains of fauna and flora, some of them nearly complete state of preservation. It has been continuously scientifically researched since 1987. The large number of finds - to date 25,000 fossil specimens have been found - have enabled a very detailed reconstruction of the landscape. This

maar A maar is a broad, low- relief volcanic crater caused by a phreatomagmatic eruption (an explosion which occurs when groundwater comes into contact with hot lava or magma). A maar characteristically fills with water to form a relatively shallo ...

, a low volcanic crater, along with research areas at the Grube Messel and the

Geiseltal The Geisel valley (german: Geiseltal) is a valley in Saxony-Anhalt, Germany, situated west of Merseburg, Saalekreis district. It is named after the River Geisel which rises in Mücheln and is a tributary of the Saale, just under long. Its main ...

valley, is one of the foremost palaeontological sites for this geological epoch in Central Europe and worldwide.

References

External links

Grabungsstelle Eckfelder Maar/Vulkaneifel
Lagerstätten Maars of the Eifel {{geology-stub