''Magallanodon'' is a genus of mammals from the extinct group

Gondwanatheria Gondwanatheria is an extinct group of mammaliaforms that lived in parts of Gondwana, including Madagascar, India, South America, Africa and Antarctica during the Upper Cretaceous through the Paleogene (and possibly much earlier, if '' Allostaff ...

. It contains a single species, ''Magallanodon baikashkenke''. The species is the first

Mesozoic The Mesozoic Era ( ), also called the Age of Reptiles, the Age of Conifers, and colloquially as the Age of the Dinosaurs is the second-to-last era of Earth's geological history, lasting from about , comprising the Triassic, Jurassic and Cretace ...

mammal known from

Chile Chile, officially the Republic of Chile, is a country in the western part of South America. It is the southernmost country in the world, and the closest to Antarctica, occupying a long and narrow strip of land between the Andes to the east a ...

, and is

Late Cretaceous The Late Cretaceous (100.5–66 Ma) is the younger of two epochs into which the Cretaceous Period is divided in the geologic time scale. Rock strata from this epoch form the Upper Cretaceous Series. The Cretaceous is named after ''creta'', ...

in age. It is known from individual teeth found in a quarry in the Río de Las Chinas Valley and La Anita Farm located in the

Magallanes Basin The Magallanes Basin or Austral Basin is a major sedimentary basin in southern Patagonia. The basin covers a surface of about and has a NNW-SSE oriented shape. The basin is bounded to the west by the Andes mountains and is separated from the Malvi ...

Patagonia Patagonia () refers to a geographical region that encompasses the southern end of South America, governed by Argentina and Chile. The region comprises the southern section of the Andes Mountains with lakes, fjords, temperate rainforests, and g ...

. The fossils come from the Dorotea Formation and

Chorrillo Formation The Chorrillo Formation, also named as Chorillo Formation,Río Leona
at Campanian The Campanian is the fifth of six ages of the Late Cretaceous Epoch on the geologic timescale of the International Commission on Stratigraphy (ICS). In chronostratigraphy, it is the fifth of six stages in the Upper Cretaceous Series. Campani ...

to Early

Maastrichtian The Maastrichtian () is, in the ICS geologic timescale, the latest age (uppermost stage) of the Late Cretaceous Epoch or Upper Cretaceous Series, the Cretaceous Period or System, and of the Mesozoic Era or Erathem. It spanned the interval ...

in age.

Etymology

The name ''Magallanodon'' comes from the

Magallanes Region The Magallanes Region (), officially the Magallanes y la Antártica Chilena Region ( es, Región de Magallanes y de la Antártica Chilena), is one of Chile's 16 first order administrative divisions. It is the southernmost, largest, and second lea ...

in southern Chile and ''odontos'', Greek for tooth. The species name, ''M. baikashkenke'' is taken from the Tehuelchian words ''bai'' (grandfather) and ''kashkenke'' (valley) - Grandfather's Valley is the name for the region where the fossil was first found, also called the Río de Las Chinas.

References

Gondwanatheres Campanian life Maastrichtian life Cretaceous mammals of South America Late Cretaceous tetrapods of South America Cretaceous Chile Fossils of Chile Fossil taxa described in 2020 Taxa named by Francisco J. Goin * {{Cite journal , last1=Chimento, first1=N., last2=Agnolin, first2=F., last3=Tsuihiji, first3=T., last4=Manabe, first4=M., last5=Novas, first5=F. , year=2020 , title=New record of a Mesozoic gondwanatherian mammaliaform from Southern Patagonia, url=https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s00114-020-01705-x , journal=The Science of Nature, volume=107, issue=6, page=49, doi=10.1007/s00114-020-01705-x, pmid=33211174, s2cid=227066248 , accessdate=2022-05-22