Original paper
Globidens(?) timorensis E. von Huene, 1935: not a durophagous mosasaur, but an enigmatic Triassic ichthyosaur
Mulder, Eric W.A.; Jagt, John W.M.
Neues Jahrbuch für Geologie und Paläontologie - Abhandlungen Band 293 Heft 1 (2019), p. 107 - 116
57 references
published: Jul 24, 2019
manuscript accepted: Jun 4, 2019
manuscript received: Nov 29, 2018
ArtNo. ESP155029301007, Price: 29.00 €
Abstract
In 1935, Erika von Huene described and illustrated three isolated sauropsid tooth crowns from Timor, tentatively attributing them to a new species of Late Cretaceous durophagous marine squamate (Mosasauridae), Globidens(?) timorensis. Based on this scanty record and a fourth additional tooth crown, this taxon has been referenced in papers discussing the global distribution of Late Cretaceous mosasaurs. However, the previous taxonomic assignment has rarely been questioned. Here, we demonstrate these specimens to be of Triassic age and to have affinities to the ichthyosaurian genera Tholodus von Meyer, 1848 (emend. von Meyer, 1851) and Xinminosaurus Jiang, Motani, Hao, Schmitz, Rieppel, Sun & Sun, 2008.
Keywords
Timor • mosasauroids • ichthyopterygians • Mesozoic • palaeobiogeography