''Donodon'' is an extinct genus of mammal from the

Ksar Metlili Formation The Ksar Metlili Formation is a geological formation in eastern High Atlas of Morocco, it is late Tithonian to Berriasian In the geological timescale, the Berriasian is an age/stage of the Early/Lower Cretaceous. It is the oldest subdivision ...

Talssint Talsint is a town and rural commune in Figuig Province, Oriental (Morocco), Oriental, Morocco. According to the 2004 census, it had a population of 7,098. Talsint enjoyed huge media coverage in Morocco, when on 20 August 2000, King Mohammed VI of ...

Morocco Morocco (),, ) officially the Kingdom of Morocco, is the westernmost country in the Maghreb region of North Africa. It overlooks the Mediterranean Sea to the north and the Atlantic Ocean to the west, and has land borders with Algeria t ...

, which has been dated to the

Late Jurassic The Late Jurassic is the third epoch of the Jurassic Period, and it spans the geologic time from 163.5 ± 1.0 to 145.0 ± 0.8 million years ago (Ma), which is preserved in Upper Jurassic strata.Owen 1987. In European lithostratigraphy, the name ...

to Early Cretaceous epochs ( Tithonian–

Berriasian In the geological timescale, the Berriasian is an age/stage of the Early/Lower Cretaceous. It is the oldest subdivision in the entire Cretaceous. It has been taken to span the time between 145.0 ± 4.0 Ma and 139.8 ± 3.0 Ma (million years ago ...

ages). The

type species In zoological nomenclature, a type species (''species typica'') is the species name with which the name of a genus or subgenus is considered to be permanently taxonomically associated, i.e., the species that contains the biological type specime ...

''D. prescriptoris'' was described in 1991 by the palaeontologist

Denise Sigogneau-Russell Denise Sigogneau-Russell (born ''c.'' 1941/42) is a French palaeontologist who specialises in mammals from the Mesozoic, particularly from France and the UK. She is currently based at the Muséum National d'Histoire Naturelle. Background Denise S ...

. A second species, ''D. minor'', was named in 2022. ''Donodon'' was a member of

Cladotheria Cladotheria is a clade (sometimes ranked as a legion) of mammals. It contains modern therian mammals (marsupials and placentals) and several extinct groups, such as the dryolestoids, amphitheriids and peramurids. The clade was named in 1975 by M ...

, a group that includes

theria Theria (; Greek: , wild beast) is a subclass of mammals amongst the Theriiformes. Theria includes the eutherians (including the placental mammals) and the metatherians (including the marsupials) but excludes the egg-laying monotremes. ...

n mammals (

marsupial Marsupials are any members of the mammalian infraclass Marsupialia. All extant marsupials are endemic to Australasia, Wallacea and the Americas. A distinctive characteristic common to most of these species is that the young are carried in a ...

s and

placentals Placental mammals (infraclass Placentalia ) are one of the three extant subdivisions of the class Mammalia, the other two being Monotremata and Marsupialia. Placentalia contains the vast majority of extant mammals, which are partly distinguishe ...

) and some of their closest relatives. It differed from dryolestids in having upper molars that were not compressed mesiodistally. Some studies have suggested that it was closely related to various South American cladotherians in the clade Meridiolestida, with specific similarities to '' Mesungulatum'', a herbivorous

mesungulatid Mesungulatidae is an extinct clade of meridiolestidan dryolestoid mammals from the Late Cretaceous of South America and possibly other Gondwannan landmasses. They are particularly notable for their ecological speciation and large size. Characte ...

, being noted.Bonaparte, J.F. 2002. New Dryolestida (Theria) from the LateCretaceous of Los Alamitos, Argentina, and paleogeographicalcomments.Neues Jahrbuch fu ̈r Geologie und Pala ̈ontologie,Abhandlungen224(3): 339–371. On the other hand, a 2022 phylogenetic analysis found it to be only distantly related to meridiolestidans, and instead closer to crown group therians.

References

Cladotheria Prehistoric mammal genera Tithonian genera Berriasian genera Late Jurassic mammals of Africa Early Cretaceous mammals of Africa Jurassic Morocco Cretaceous Morocco Fossils of Morocco Fossil taxa described in 1991 {{Cretaceous-mammal-stub