Caenophidia

The Caenophidia are a derived clade of alethinophidian snakes, which contains over 80% of all the extant species of snakes. The largest family is Colubridae, but it also includes at least seven other families, at least four of which were once classified as "Colubridae" before molecular phylogenetics helped us understand their relationships. It has been found to be monophyletic.

Caenophidia

Clinton & Charles Robertson from Del Rio, Texas & San Marcos, TX, USA · CC BY 2.0 · 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
AlethinophidiaPBDB
Motility
actively mobilePBDB, for Osteichthyes
Environment
terrestrialPBDB, for Amniota

Time the record covers

At least 60 million years on record.

The record covers at least 66 Mya to 5.09 Mya. No occurrence read is dated outside 83.6 Mya to 3.55 Mya.

Late Cretaceous — about 2 of 26 occurrencesLate CretaceousPaleocene — about 0 of 26 occurrencesPaleoceneEocene — about 12 of 26 occurrencesEoceneOligocene — about 0 of 26 occurrencesMiocene — about 8 of 26 occurrencesMiocenePliocene — about 4 of 26 occurrencesPleistocene — about 0 of 26 occurrences85–82 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences82–80 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences80–77 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences77–74 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences74–71 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences71–69 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences69–66 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences60–57 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences57–55 Mya — about 1 occurrence55–52 Mya — about 2 occurrences52–49 Mya — about 2 occurrences49–46 Mya — about 1 occurrence46–44 Mya — about 0.8 occurrences44–41 Mya — about 0.8 occurrences41–38 Mya — about 0.8 occurrences38–35 Mya — about 2 occurrences35–32 Mya — about 1 occurrence21–19 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences19–16 Mya — about 0.6 occurrences16–13 Mya — about 3 occurrences13–10 Mya — about 2 occurrences10–7.5 Mya — about 1 occurrence7.5–4.7 Mya — about 3 occurrences4.7–1.9 Mya — about 3 occurrences66 Mya5.09 Mya85 Mya2 Mya

26 occurrences of Caenophidia on record, most of them in the Eocene. The Paleobiology Database records this as a living group, and the chart stops with its fossils rather than at the present. 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

26 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

9 formations

Komnina — 40.43°N, 21.80°EWadi Milk — 20.00°N, 30.00°EWadi Milk — 16.70°N, 31.14°ECambay Shale — 21.40°N, 73.08°EBirket Qarun — 29.60°N, 30.60°EProlemais — 40.50°N, 21.74°EMansar — 32.71°N, 74.85°ECreechbarrow Limestone — 50.65°N, 2.12°WHeadon Hill — 50.72°N, 1.59°WChhasra — 23.44°N, 70.99°E

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The named rock units Caenophidia has been recovered from, largest first. Drawn where the rock is now, not where it formed. 11 occurrences have no formation on record, which is common for older literature.

Caenophidia and its relatives

Eocene

Where Caenophidia and its relatives were recorded in the Eocene.

Found in the same rock

502 taxa

The Paleobiology Database records 23 sites for Caenophidia, 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

15 references

Each of the 26 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. 3 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 Caenophidia

Credit
Clinton & Charles Robertson from Del Rio, Texas & San Marcos, TX, USA
Licence
CC BY 2.0
Commercial use
the licence allows it

No 3D scan of Caenophidia was found in Sketchfab.

Smithsonian Open Access and MorphoSource were 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 itAlethinophidia through timeFormations of the EoceneThe world it lived on

Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0. (Hoffstetter 1939)