Palaeophiidae is an extinct family of

marine Marine is an adjective meaning of or pertaining to the sea or ocean. Marine or marines may refer to: Ocean * Maritime (disambiguation) * Marine art * Marine biology * Marine debris * Marine habitats * Marine life * Marine pollution Military * ...

snake Snakes are elongated, Limbless vertebrate, limbless, carnivore, carnivorous reptiles of the suborder Serpentes . Like all other Squamata, squamates, snakes are ectothermic, amniote vertebrates covered in overlapping Scale (zoology), scales. Ma ...

within the infraorder

Alethinophidia :''Common names: advanced snakes.'' The Alethinophidia are an infraorder of snakes that includes all snakes other than blind snakes and thread snakes. Snakes have long been grouped into families within Alethinophidia based on their morphology, e ...

. Species within this family lived from the

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'', the ...

to the

Late Eocene The Eocene ( ) Epoch is a geological epoch that lasted from about 56 to 33.9 million years ago (mya). It is the second epoch of the Paleogene Period in the modern Cenozoic Era. The name ''Eocene'' comes from the Ancient Greek (''ēṓs'', "daw ...

, approximately from 70.6 to 33.9 million years ago.Palaeophiidae
at

Fossilworks Fossilworks is a portal which provides query, download, and analysis tools to facilitate access to the Paleobiology Database The Paleobiology Database is an online resource for information on the distribution and classification of fossil animals ...

.org Phylogenetic analysis has proposed them as being related to the extant file snakes (family

Acrochordidae The Acrochordidae, commonly known as wart snakes, Java wart snakes, file snakes, elephant trunk snakes, or dogface snakes are a monogeneric family created for the genus ''Acrochordus''. This is a group of basal aquatic snakes found in Australia a ...

), although these results have been disputed since and new analysis show this relationship as poorly supported.

Subfamilies and genera

* Archaeophiinae Rage et al. 2003 ** ''

Archaeophis ''Archaeophis'' is an extinct genus of snake from the Eocene of Monte Bolca Monte Bolca is a lagerstätte near Verona, Italy that was one of the first fossil sites with high quality preservation known to Europeans, and is still an important ...

'' Massalongo 1859 * Palaeopheinae Lydekker, 1888 ** ''

Palaeophis ''Palaeophis'' ('ancient snake') is an extinct genus of marine snake that is the type genus of the extinct snake family Palaeophiidae. Described species within this genus lived in the Eocene epoch, with some unnamed or questionable records from ...

'' Owen 1841 ** ''

Pterosphenus ''Pterosphenus'' is an extinct genus of marine snake of the Eocene period. Classification ''Pterosphenus'' belong to the Alethinophidia snakes, a clade which includes all snakes outside of blind and thread snakes, and more specifically to th ...

'' Lucas 1898

References

Cretaceous snakes Prehistoric reptile families Cretaceous first appearances Eocene extinctions Cretaceous–Paleogene boundary Taxa named by Richard Lydekker {{snake-stub