Sclerocephalus ( lat. Sclerocephalus ) - an extinct representative of the dark spondyls of the Early Permian era. Belongs to the group of archegozavroid . Outwardly similar to eriopoids, probably convergent.
† Sclerocephalus | ||||||||||||
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 Sclerocephalus haeuseri - adult | ||||||||||||
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| Sclerocephalus |
Previously, this genus was attributed to the eriopid family. Now it is more often allocated in a special family Actinodontidae . The fact is that the genus Actinodon is now included in the genus Sclerocephalus .
Content
- 1 Description
- 2 Fossil Findings
- 3 Literature
- 4 References
Description
Sclerocephalus is a large animal, old individuals of the type species S. haeuseri reached almost 2 meters in length. Young individuals were distinguished by a rounded head, with age, the muzzle lengthened and in old animals resembled the alligator's muzzle. The tail is long, powerful, especially in young animals, shortened with age. Larvae and young individuals had external gills, with small “teeth” on the gill arches, and led a purely aquatic lifestyle. The larvae have long been known as Branchiosaurus amblystomus and Pelosaurus laticeps , often depicted in old books on paleontology. Adult and old animals could be more terrestrial, most likely, resembled crocodiles in their lifestyle.
The limbs are short, massive. The abdominal carapace of rhombic scales is well developed; there are also individual scales on the back and sides. Numerous remains of young individuals are confined to deposits of deep lakes, at the same time, the remains of adults are found in other places (corresponding to smaller lakes and swamps). The larvae fed on small crustaceans, insects, and as they grew, they switched to food on vertebrates (in the stomach of one of the young individuals, the remains of small paleoniscus fish were found). Adults fed mainly on fish; cases of cannibalism (the remains of young individuals in the abdominal cavity of adults) were also described.
Numerous coprolites of adults are known. Many specimens of the type species were found in the Early Permian (Assel-Sakmara) sediments of southwestern Germany, in the Saar coal basin. These are deposits of the so-called Humberg Lake, which occupied an area of up to 3400 km² in early Perm. The genus was described by G. Goldfuss in 1847 .
Fossil Finds
The genus Actinodon was described by A. Godrey in 1866 from the early Permian of France. This is a large amphibian, up to 1.5 meters long. The skull is similar to the skull of sclerocephalus and, since 2000, actinodon has been included in the genus Sclerocephalus as a species of S. frossardi . Species S. credneri is known from the early Permian of the Czech Republic.
Other species are described from Bavaria and India. A synonym for the genus are Leptorophus and Macromerion .
Literature
- Gaudry A. L'actinodon. Paris: G. Masson, 1887. 32 p., 3 pl.