Qasr el Sagha Formation
geological formation in Egypt
The Qasr el Sagha Formation is a geological formation located in Egypt. The formation is part of the Wadi El Hitan World Heritage Site. The Qasr el Sagha Formation overlies the Birket Qarun Formation and is overlain by the Gebel Qatrani Formation. The sandstones and shales of the formation were deposited in a deltaic to shallow marine environment. It dates to the Late Eocene (middle Priabonian, 37.2 to 33.9 million years ago).
Paleontological significance
Fossils of the early whale genus Saghacetus ("Sagha whale", originally named "Zeuglodon osiris") were first collected at Qasr al Sagha by German explorer Georg August Schweinfurth in January 1886 (a well-preserved dentary).Saghacetus is common in the middle of Qasr el Sagha, but there are few other specimens of archaeocetes whales; the only exception being the enigmatic "Prozeuglodon stromeri", named in 1828 based on specimens from 1904, but never adequately described before their destruction during the bombing of Munich in World War II.
Other fossils found in the formation include:
Mammals
Afrotheres
Ferae
Ungulates
Reptiles
Squamates
Testudines
Fish
Misrichthys stromeri
Carcharhinus aff. frequens
Odontorhytis aff. pappenheimi
?Jacquhermania attiai
Carcharhinus sp.
Coupatezia sp.
Ouledia sp.
“Qasr el Sagha Formation” enters the record as geological formation in Egypt. Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what Qasr, Sagha and Formation can confirm, complicate or overturn.
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The citation trail is more important than the brevity of the summary: it shows where individual claims can be examined in context. The source revision retrieved here is dated May 29, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q1631936. Authority coordinates are 29.500, 30.500. None of the 1 selected statements returned an explicit reference. The first chronological checks are 1886, 1828 and 1904.
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This entry incorporates text from “Qasr el Sagha Formation” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.