Definition: The Carboniferous Period (360 to 286 million years ago), also known as the Age of Amphibians, is the fifth of six periods during the Paleozoic Era. It is preceeded by the Devonian Period and followed by the Permian Period.
The Carboniferous Period saw the first true bony fishes, the first sharks and the first amphibians evolve. It also was the time period during which the first amniotes arose. The amniotic egg, the defining characteristic of amniotes, enabled the ancestors or modern reptiles, birds, and mammals to to reproduce on land and colonise terrestrial habitats that were previously uninhabited by vertebrates.
The Carboniferous Period was a time of mountain building when the collsion of the Laurussian and Godwanaland land masses uplifted what today are the Appalacian Mountains, the Hercynian Mountains, and the Ural Mountains.
