Hamptonia christi
sponge
Early Ordovician (Arenigian)
Fezouata Formation
Mecissi-Zagora Region, Draa Valley, Morocco

27mm sponge on 160mm matrix.

Soft-bodied. Lagerstatten.

Hamptonia is a genus of sea sponge known from the Middle Cambrian Burgess Shale.  This specimen extends its chronologic range into the Early Ordovician and its paleogeographic range to northern Africa.

Paleontologists consider sponges to be among the oldest groups of modern animals.  It appears that they diverged from their ancestors in Precambrian time.  The earliest-known sponge fossils are Cambrian age and bear the same biomineralized skeletal structure as modern forms.  How that skeleton developed remains a mystery.

Oh yeah, there are sponge collectors out there. Here’s one with with good color from a recently-discovered deposit.