Editing Trilobite (section)

== History of usage and research ==
[[File:Flatfish Lhwyd.jpg|right|thumb|Drawing of ''[[Ogygiocarella|Ogygiocarella debuchii]]'' by Rev. Edward Lhwyd, made in 1698]]Rev. [[Edward Lhwyd]] published in 1698 in The ''[[Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society]]'', the oldest scientific journal in the English language, part of his letter "Concerning Several Regularly Figured Stones Lately Found by Him", that was accompanied by a page of etchings of fossils.<ref name="McKay">{{cite web|author= John J. McKay|title= The first trilobite |url= http://johnmckay.blogspot.nl/2011/11/first-trilobite.html|publisher= OhioLINK ETD Center |access-date=3 October 2012|date= 2011-11-22 }}</ref> One of his etchings depicted a trilobite he found near [[Llandeilo]], probably on the grounds of Lord Dynefor's castle, he described as "the skeleton of some flat Fish".<ref name=Fortey00a />

The discovery of ''[[Calymene blumenbachii]]'' (the Dudley locust) in 1749 by Charles Lyttleton, could be identified as the beginning of trilobite research. Lyttleton submitted a letter to the Royal Society of London in 1750 concerning a "petrified insect" he found in the "limestone pits at Dudley". In 1754, Manuel Mendez da Costa proclaimed that the Dudley locust was not an insect, but instead belonged to "the crustaceous tribe of animals". He proposed to call the Dudley specimens ''Pediculus marinus major trilobos'' (large trilobed marine louse), a name which lasted well into the 19th century. German naturalist [[Johann Ernst Immanuel Walch|Johann Walch]], who executed the first inclusive study of this group, proposed the use of the name "trilobite". He considered it appropriate to derive the name from the unique three-lobed character of the central axis and a pleural zone to each side.<ref name="Chestnut">{{cite web |author=Alex J. Chestnut |title=Using morphometrics, phylogenetic systematics and parsimony analysis to gain insight into the evolutionary affinities of the Calymenidae Trilobita |url=http://etd.ohiolink.edu/view.cgi?acc_num=wright1239724101 |publisher=OhioLINK ETD Center |access-date=August 21, 2011 |archive-date=March 31, 2012 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120331123221/http://etd.ohiolink.edu/view.cgi?acc_num=wright1239724101 |url-status=dead }}</ref>

Written descriptions of trilobites date possibly from the third century BC and definitely from the fourth century AD. The Spanish geologists Eladio Liñán and Rodolfo Gozalo argue that some of the fossils described in Greek and Latin [[Lapidary|lapidaries]] as scorpion stone, beetle stone, and ant stone, refer to trilobite fossils. Less ambiguous references to trilobite fossils can be found in Chinese sources. Fossils from the Kushan formation of northeastern China were prized as inkstones and decorative pieces.<ref name="McKay"/>

In the [[New World]], American fossil hunters found plentiful deposits of [[Elrathia|''Elrathia kingi'']] in western [[Utah]] in the 1860s. Until the early 1900s, the [[Ute people|Ute Native Americans]] of Utah wore these trilobites, which they called ''pachavee'' (little water bug), as [[amulet]]s.<ref name=Joleen/><ref name=AlexandraMichael2010>{{cite journal |last1=van der Geer |first1=Alexandra |last2=Dermitzakis |first2=Michael |date=2010 |title=Fossils in pharmacy: from "snake eggs" to "Saint's bones"; an overview |url=http://www.hellenjgeosci.geol.uoa.gr/45/van%20der%20Geer%20&%20Dermitzakis.pdf |journal=[[Hellenic Journal of Geosciences]] |volume=45 |pages=323–332 }}</ref> A hole was bored in the head and the fossil was worn on a string.<ref name=Joleen>{{Citation |author=Joleen Robinson |title=Tracking the Trilobites |journal=Desert Magazine |date=October 1970}}</ref> According to the Ute themselves, trilobite necklaces protect against bullets and diseases such as [[diphtheria]].<ref name=Joleen/><ref name=AlexandraMichael2010/> In 1931, Frank Beckwith uncovered evidence of the Ute use of trilobites. Travelling through the badlands, he photographed two [[petroglyph]]s that most likely represent trilobites. On the same trip he examined a burial, of unknown age, with a drilled trilobite fossil lying in the chest cavity of the interred. Since then, trilobite amulets have been found all over the Great Basin, as well as in British Columbia and Australia.<ref name="McKay"/>

In the 1880s, archaeologists discovered in the Grotte du Trilobite ([[Caves of Arcy-sur-Cure]], [[Yonne]], France) a much-handled trilobite fossil that had been drilled as if to be worn as a pendant. The occupation stratum in which the trilobite was found has been dated as 15,000 years old. Because the pendant was handled so much, the species of trilobite cannot be determined. This type of trilobite is not found around Yonne, so it may have been highly prized and traded from elsewhere.<ref name="McKay"/>