Evolution of the Vertebrates, subtitled "A History of the Backboned Animals Through Time" is a basic paleontology textbook

Textbook

A textbook or coursebook is a manual of instruction in any branch of study. Textbooks are produced according to the demands of educational institutions...

 by Edwin H. Colbert, published by John Wiley & Sons

John Wiley & Sons

John Wiley & Sons, Inc., also referred to as Wiley, is a global publishing company that specializes in academic publishing and markets its products to professionals and consumers, students and instructors in higher education, and researchers and practitioners in scientific, technical, medical, and...

.

Overview

The first and second editions (1955 and 1969) provide an overview of the entire range of vertebrate evolution, and are illustrated by the distinctive drawings of Lois Darling. The style of writing is very light and readable, and technical concepts kept to a minimum. In the book vertebrate evolution is studied utilizing comparative anatomy & functional morphology of existing vertebrates, and fossil records. The book is "considered a classic" (New York Times, 25 November 2001) and was used very frequently as a college-level text on the subjects of basic paleontology

Paleontology

Paleontology "old, ancient", ὄν, ὀντ- "being, creature", and λόγος "speech, thought") is the study of prehistoric life. It includes the study of fossils to determine organisms' evolution and interactions with each other and their environments...

 and vertebrate evolution.

These editions predate the cladistic revolution

Cladistics

Cladistics is a method of classifying species of organisms into groups called clades, which consist of an ancestor organism and all its descendants . For example, birds, dinosaurs, crocodiles, and all descendants of their most recent common ancestor form a clade...

 and so contain a number of chapters and sections dedicated to paraphyletic taxa (Labyrinthodonts, Thecodont

Thecodont

Thecodont , now considered an obsolete term, was formerly used to describe a diverse range of early archosaurs that first appeared in the Latest Permian and flourished until the end of the Triassic period...

s, Condylarth

Condylarth

Condylarthra is an order of extinct placental mammals known primarily from the Paleocene and Eocene epochs. Condylarths are among the most characteristic Paleocene mammals and they illustrate the evolutionary level of the Paleocene mammal fauna....

s, etc.) which nevertheless constituted an important part of the understanding of the time.

Latest Publishing

The latest edition, the fifth edition, was cowritten with Michael Morales and Eli C. Minkoff, and has been revised to incorporate recent discoveries and current developments in the field of vertebrate evolution. This new addition includes entirely new sections. Some examples of these are conodonts, primates, and dinosaurs. Some new topics that the fifth edition discuss are:

• Analysis of morphological and molecular data
• Early ruling reptiles
• Basic adaptation of ungulates
• Early diversification of vertebrates
• The evolution of dinosaurs
• The origin of mammals

The fifth edition has generally received praise from both professors and students using this textbook on the college level. It has, however, received mild criticism for its out-of-date material. Others however argue that the broad scope of the edits in the fifth edition make up for any generalizations pertaining to specific details related to geological palentology.