| Definition/Meaning | Word/Phrase |
|---|
| extinct small mostly diurnal lower primates that fed on leaves and fruit; abundant in North America and Europe 30 to 50 million years ago; their descendents probably include the lemurs; some authorities consider them ancestral to anthropoids but others co |
Adapid
,
Adapid group
|
| South American cavy; possibly ancestral to the domestic guinea pig |
aperea
,
Cavia porcellus
,
wild cavy
|
| plant bearing very small and very hot oblong red fruits; includes wild forms native to tropical America; thought to be ancestral to the sweet pepper and many hot peppers |
bird pepper
,
Capsicum baccatum
,
Capsicum frutescens baccatum
|
| large division of chiefly freshwater eukaryotic algae that possess chlorophyll a and b, store food as starch, and cellulose cell walls; classes Chlorophyceae, Ulvophyceae, and Charophyceae; obviously ancestral to land plants |
Chlorophyta
,
division Chlorophyta
|
| word is cognate with another if both derive from the same word in an ancestral language |
cognate
,
cognate word
|
| fishes having paired fins resembling limbs and regarded as ancestral to amphibians |
Crossopterygii
,
subclass Crossopterygii
|
| small Asiatic wild bird; believed to be ancestral to domestic fowl |
gallina
,
jungle fowl
|
| jungle fowl of southeastern Asia that is considered ancestral to the domestic fowl |
Gallus gallus
,
red jungle fowl
|
| chiefly tropical or xerophytic woody plants; practically unknown as fossils but considered close to the ancestral line of angiosperms |
Gnetales
,
order Gnetales
|
| North American three-toed Oligocene animal; probably not directly ancestral to modern horses |
mesohippus
|
| extinct tiny nocturnal lower primates that fed on fruit and insects; abundant in North America and Europe 30 to 50 million years ago; probably gave rise to the tarsiers; some authorities consider them ancestral to anthropoids but others consider them only |
Omomyid
,
Omomyid group
|
| generalized extinct mammals widespread during the Jurassic; commonly conceded to be ancestral to marsupial and placental mammals |
Pantotheria
,
subclass Pantotheria
|
| ancestral lineage |
pedigree
|
| ancestral fossil type from which modern gymnosperms are thought to have derived |
progymnosperm
|
| extinct reptiles of the Permian to Jurassic considered ancestral to mammals |
subclass Synapsida
,
Synapsida
|
| presumably in the common ancestral line to dinosaurs and crocodiles and birds |
thecodont
,
thecodont reptile
|
