''Ichniotherium'' (meaning "marking creature") is an

ichnogenus An ichnotaxon (plural ichnotaxa) is "a taxon based on the fossilized work of an organism", i.e. the non-human equivalent of an artifact. ''Ichnotaxa'' comes from the Greek ίχνος, ''ichnos'' meaning ''track'' and ταξις, ''taxis'' meaning ...

tetrapod Tetrapods (; ) are four-limbed vertebrate animals constituting the superclass Tetrapoda (). It includes extant and extinct amphibians, sauropsids ( reptiles, including dinosaurs and therefore birds) and synapsids ( pelycosaurs, extinct t ...

footprint Footprints are the impressions or images left behind by a person walking or running. Hoofprints and pawprints are those left by animals with hooves or paws rather than feet, while "shoeprints" is the specific term for prints made by shoes. The ...

s from between the Late Carboniferous period to the Early

Permian The Permian ( ) is a geologic period and System (stratigraphy), stratigraphic system which spans 47 million years from the end of the Carboniferous Period million years ago (Mya), to the beginning of the Triassic Period 251.9 Mya. It is the last ...

period attributed to diadectomorph track-makers.Buchwitz M & Voigt S. (2018
On the morphological variability of Ichniotherium tracks and evolution of locomotion in the sistergroup of amniotes
PeerJ 6:e4346 https://doi.org/10.7717/peerj.4346 These footprints are commonly found in

Europe Europe is a large peninsula conventionally considered a continent in its own right because of its great physical size and the weight of its history and traditions. Europe is also considered a subcontinent of Eurasia and it is located entirel ...

, and have also been identified in North America and

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 ...

. Three ichnospecies of ''Ichniotherium'' have been proposed as valid: ''I. cotta'', ''I. sphaerodactylum'', and ''I. praesidentis.'' In a 2007 study, the diadectid

species In biology, a species is the basic unit of classification and a taxonomic rank of an organism, as well as a unit of biodiversity. A species is often defined as the largest group of organisms in which any two individuals of the appropriate s ...

Diadectes ''Diadectes'' (meaning ''crosswise-biter'') is an extinct genus of large reptiliomorphs or synapsids that lived during the early Permian period ( Artinskian- Kungurian stages of the Cisuralian epoch, between 290 and 272 million years ago). ''Diad ...

absitus'' was determined to be the track-maker associated with ''I. cotta'' tracks, and the related diadectid species ''

Orobates ''Orobates'' is an extinct genus of diadectid reptiliomorphs that lived during the Early Permian. Its fossilised remains were found in Germany. A combination of primitive and derived traits (i.e. autapomorphic and plesiomorphic) distinguish ...

pabsti'' was linked to ''I. praesidentis'' based on analysis of Lower

trackways and fossils skeletons in

Germany Germany,, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It is the second most populous country in Europe after Russia, and the most populous member state of the European Union. Germany is situated betwe ...

Society of Vertebrate Paleontology. (2007, September 18). "Who Went There? Matching Fossil Tracks With Their Makers". ''ScienceDaily''. Retrieved February 21, 2018 from www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2007/09/070915092239.htm

References

Trace fossils {{trace-fossil-stub