Aigialosauridae

Aigialosauridae is a family of Late Cretaceous semiaquatic pythonomorph lizards closely related to the mosasaurs. Regarded by some paleontologists as a distinct monophyletic group and by others as an adaptive grade within the basal mosasauroids, recent molecular and morphological data suggests that they are the oldest known members of the lineage leading to the mosasaurs.

Aigialosauridae

Ghedoghedo · CC BY-SA 3.0 · via Wikipedia/Commons. May be a photograph of a specimen, or an artist’s reconstruction — an interpretation of a skeleton, since colour and soft tissue are almost never preserved.

On record

Recorded, not inferred
Sits inside
MosasauroideaPBDB
Motility
actively mobilePBDB, for Osteichthyes
Environment
marinePBDB, for Mosasauroidea

Time the record covers

At least 32 million years on record.

The record covers at least 132.6 Mya to 100.5 Mya. No occurrence read is dated outside 137.05 Mya to 66 Mya.

Early Cretaceous — about 1 of 17 occurrencesEarly CretaceousLate Cretaceous — about 16 of 17 occurrencesLate CretaceousPaleocene — about 0 of 17 occurrences138–136 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences136–134 Mya — about 0.6 occurrences134–131 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences102–99 Mya — about 3 occurrences99–97 Mya — about 5 occurrences97–94 Mya — about 5 occurrences94–92 Mya — about 1.0 occurrences92–89 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences89–87 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences87–84 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences84–82 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences82–79 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences79–77 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences77–74 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences74–72 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences72–70 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences70–67 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences67–65 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences132.6 Mya100.5 Mya138 Mya65 Mya

17 occurrences of Aigialosauridae on record. Bar height is expected occurrences, not a count: each fossil is spread across the span it is dated to, so a tall narrow bar means tight dating and a low wide one means loose.

When

17 occurrences

These are dates about fossils, not the animal: the record can only begin after it arose and end before it died out, so either end may reach further. Shares are expected occurrences: a fossil dated to a span is counted partly in each period it straddles. More on what this infers.

Found in

7 formations

Starigrad Limestone — 43.19°N, 16.65°ELa Cabaña — 43.34°N, 5.84°WWadhurst Clay — 50.86°N, 0.44°EB3/C1 — 45.93°N, 0.98°WBet Meir or Amminadav — 31.95°N, 35.26°ETentúgal — 40.25°N, 8.57°WArenas de Utrillas — 40.96°N, 2.67°W

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The named rock units Aigialosauridae has been recovered from, largest first. Drawn where the rock is now, not where it formed. 7 occurrences have no formation on record, which is common for older literature.

Found in the same rock

175 taxa

The Paleobiology Database records 15 sites for Aigialosauridae, and this reads all of them. The number is how many of those sites it was catalogued from too. The 24 sharing the most are listed.

This is not a list of everything alive at the time. It is only what has come out of the same ground as this animal and been written down.

Entered from

10 references

Each of the 17 occurrences read was entered from one of these publications, ordered by how many each accounts for. This is not a search for papers mentioning the name. Entries link to doi.org where the Paleobiology Database holds an identifier, and to its own record where it does not. Relayed as the Paleobiology Database holds them, not checked against what they resolve to.

Media and terms

Media content1

Picture of Aigialosauridae

Credit
Ghedoghedo
Licence
CC BY-SA 3.0
Commercial use
the licence allows it

No 3D scan of Aigialosauridae was found in MorphoSource and Sketchfab.

Smithsonian Open Access was not reached for this taxon, so this list is what the others held rather than everything there is.

The description on this site

Licence
CC BY-SA 4.0

This is what the site found, which is not the same as what exists.

Keep going

What may have been alongside itMosasauroidea through timeThe world it lived on

Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0. (Kramberger 1892)