Simosaurus

Simosaurus is an extinct genus of marine reptile within the superorder Sauropterygia from the Middle Triassic of central Europe. Fossils have been found in deposits in France and Germany that are roughly 230 million years old. It is usually classified as a nothosaur, but has also been considered a pachypleurosaur or a more primitive sauropterygian.

Simosaurus

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
SimosauridaePBDB
Motility
actively mobilePBDB, for Osteichthyes
Environment
marinePBDB, for Sauropterygia

Time the record covers

At least 35 million years on record.

The record covers at least 241.464 Mya to 205.7 Mya. No occurrence read is dated outside 247 Mya to 201.4 Mya.

Early Triassic — about 0 of 15 occurrencesMiddle Triassic — about 12 of 15 occurrencesMiddle TriassicLate Triassic — about 3 of 15 occurrencesLate TriassicEarly Jurassic — about 0 of 15 occurrences248–246 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences246–245 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences245–243 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences243–242 Mya — about 1.0 occurrences242–240 Mya — about 3 occurrences240–238 Mya — about 4 occurrences238–237 Mya — about 4 occurrences237–235 Mya — about 0.6 occurrences235–234 Mya — about 0.6 occurrences234–232 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences232–231 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences231–229 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences229–227 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences227–226 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences207–205 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences205–204 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences204–202 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences202–200 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences241.464 Mya205.7 Mya247.9 Mya200.5 Mya

15 occurrences of Simosaurus on record, most of them in the Middle Triassic. 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

15 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

5 formations

Jilh — 26.39°N, 44.24°EJilh — 24.25°N, 45.63°EErfurt — 48.90°N, 9.20°EGevanim — 30.60°N, 34.82°ERio del Lago — 46.46°N, 13.32°ERaibl — 47.73°N, 12.69°E

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The named rock units Simosaurus has been recovered from, largest first. Drawn where the rock is now, not where it formed. 9 occurrences have no formation on record, which is common for older literature.

Simosaurus and its relatives

Middle Triassic

Where Simosaurus and its relatives were recorded in the Middle Triassic.

Found in the same rock

60 taxa

The Paleobiology Database records 14 sites for Simosaurus, 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 15 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 Simosaurus

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

No 3D scan of Simosaurus 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 itSimosauridae through timeFormations of the Middle TriassicThe world it lived on

Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0. Meyer 1842