Fossils are the petrified remains of former living organisms. Their systematics and their former living conditions are studied and described in palaeontology. This book attempts to show the character of these life forms as signs and to pursue the question of whether fossils and representations of fossils can be considered 'beautiful'.
Until his retirement Hillert Ibbeken was a professor of geology at the Freie Universität Berlin, but his lifelong occupation has been architectural photography.