Akidnognathidae
Akidnognathidae is an extinct family of therocephalian therapsids from the Late Permian and Early Triassic of South Africa, Russia and China. The family includes many large-bodied therocephalians that were carnivorous, including Moschorhinus and Olivierosuchus. One akidnognathid, Euchambersia, may even have been venomous. Akidnognathids have robust skulls with a pair of large caniniform teeth in their upper jaws. The family is morphologically intermediate between the more basal therocephalian group Scylacosauridae and the more derived group Baurioidea.

Jun Liu, Fernando Abdala · CC BY 4.0 · 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
- EutherocephaliaPBDB
- Diet
- carnivorePBDB, for Therocephalia
- Motility
- actively mobilePBDB, for Osteichthyes
- Environment
- terrestrialPBDB, for Amniota
Time the record covers
At least 2.2 million years on record.
The record covers at least 254.14 Mya to 251.902 Mya. No occurrence read is dated outside 259.857 Mya to 247 Mya.
41 occurrences of Akidnognathidae on record, most of them in the Permian. 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
41 occurrences- Permian55%
- Early Triassic45%
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
5 formations
- Balfour Formation · Beaufort Group7
- Katberg Formation · Beaufort Group3
- Normandien Formation · Beaufort Group2
- Naobaogou Formation2
- Fremouw Formation · Beacon Group1
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The named rock units Akidnognathidae has been recovered from, largest first. Drawn where the rock is now, not where it formed. 26 occurrences have no formation on record, which is common for older literature.
Akidnognathidae and its relatives
PermianWhere Akidnognathidae and its relatives were recorded in the Permian.
Found in the same rock
52 taxa- Moschorhinus kitchingi18 sites
- Lystrosaurus declivis7 sites
- Lystrosaurus curvatus6 sites
- Lystrosaurus murrayi6 sites
- Olivierosuchus parringtoni4 sites
- Prolacerta broomi3 sites
- Tetracynodon darti3 sites
- Thrinaxodon liorhinus3 sites
- Dolomitipes accordii2 sites
- Galesaurus planiceps2 sites
- Lystrosaurus2 sites
- Lystrosaurus maccaigi2 sites
- Nanictosaurus kitchingi2 sites
- Procolophon trigoniceps2 sites
- Procynosuchus delaharpeae2 sites
- Promoschorhynchus platyrhinus2 sites
- Proterosuchidae2 sites
- Proterosuchus fergusi2 sites
- Broomistega putterilli1 site
- Cynosaurus suppostus1 site
- Cyonosaurus rubidgei1 site
- Daptocephalus leoniceps1 site
- Dicynodontia1 site
- Dicynodontipus1 site
The Paleobiology Database records 24 sites for Akidnognathidae, 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
14 references- Body size and growth patterns in the therocephalian Moschorhinus kitchingi (Therapsida: Eutheriodontia) before and after the end-Permian extinction in South Africa16
- The distribution of the Karroo vertebrate fauna7
- A new skeleton of the therocephalian synapsid Olivierosuchus parringtoni from the Lower Triassic South African Karoo Basin4
- On the Whatsiidae, a family of therocephalian mammal-like reptiles4
- The tetrapod fauna of the upper Permian Naobaogou Formation of China: 3. Jiufengia jiai gen. et sp. nov., a large akidnognathid therocephalian1
- The tetrapod fauna of the upper Permian Naobaogou Formation of China: 1. Shiguaignathus wangi gen. et sp. nov., the first akidnognathid therocephalian from China1
- Taxonomic revision of therocephalians (Therapsida: Theriodontia) from the Lower Triassic of Antarctica1
- Do extraordinarily high growth rates in Permo-Triassic dicynodonts (Therapsida, Anomodontia) explain their success before and after the end-Permian extinction?1
- Barendskraal, a diverse amniote locality from the Lystrosaurus assemblage zone, early Triassic of South Africa1
- A revised description of the skull of Moschorhinus (Therapsida, Therocephalia)1
- A new ictidosuchid (Scaloposauria) from the Lystrosaurus-zone1
- The Rubidge Collection of fossil Karroo vertebrates1
Each of the 41 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. 2 further references are not listed. 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 Akidnognathidae
- Source
- Wikipedia/Commons
- Credit
- Jun Liu, Fernando Abdala
- Licence
- CC BY 4.0
- Commercial use
- the licence allows it
No 3D scan of Akidnognathidae 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 itEutherocephalia through timeFormations of the PermianThe world it lived on
Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0. Nopcsa 1923