''Ebrachosuchus'' is an extinct

genus Genus ( plural genera ) is a taxonomic rank used in the biological classification of living and fossil organisms as well as viruses. In the hierarchy of biological classification, genus comes above species and below family. In binomial nom ...

of basal

phytosaur Phytosaurs (Φυτόσαυροι in greek) are an extinct group of large, mostly semiaquatic Late Triassic archosauriform reptiles. Phytosaurs belong to the order Phytosauria. Phytosauria and Phytosauridae are often considered to be equivalent g ...

known from the

Late Triassic The Late Triassic is the third and final epoch of the Triassic Period in the geologic time scale, spanning the time between Ma and Ma (million years ago). It is preceded by the Middle Triassic Epoch and followed by the Early Jurassic Epoch. ...

(late

Carnian The Carnian (less commonly, Karnian) is the lowermost stage (stratigraphy), stage of the Upper Triassic series (stratigraphy), Series (or earliest age (geology), age of the Late Triassic Epoch (reference date), Epoch). It lasted from 237 to 227 m ...

stage) of

Bavaria Bavaria ( ; ), officially the Free State of Bavaria (german: Freistaat Bayern, link=no ), is a state in the south-east of Germany. With an area of , Bavaria is the largest German state by land area, comprising roughly a fifth of the total lan ...

, southern

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 ...

. It is known only from the

holotype A holotype is a single physical example (or illustration) of an organism, known to have been used when the species (or lower-ranked taxon) was formally described. It is either the single such physical example (or illustration) or one of sever ...

BSPG 1931 X 501, a complete

skull The skull is a bone protective cavity for the brain. The skull is composed of four types of bone i.e., cranial bones, facial bones, ear ossicles and hyoid bone. However two parts are more prominent: the cranium and the mandible. In humans, th ...

missing both

mandible In anatomy, the mandible, lower jaw or jawbone is the largest, strongest and lowest bone in the human facial skeleton. It forms the lower jaw and holds the lower teeth in place. The mandible sits beneath the maxilla. It is the only movable bone ...

s. It was collected at Ebrach Quarry, bed number 9 from the late Carnian-aged Blasensandstein Member of the Hassberge Formation. It was first named by

Oskar Kuhn Oskar Kuhn (7 March 1908, Munich – 1990) was a German palaeontologist. Life and career Kuhn was educated in Dinkelsbühl and Bamberg and then studied natural science, specialising in geology and paleontology, at the University of Munich, f ...

1936 Events January–February * January 20 – George V of the United Kingdom and the British Dominions and Emperor of India, dies at his Sandringham Estate. The Prince of Wales succeeds to the throne of the United Kingdom as King E ...

and 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 ...

is ''Ebrachosuchus neukami''.Kuhn, O. (1936). Weitere Parasuchier und Labyrinthodonten aus dem Blasensandstein des mittleren Keuper von Ebrach. ''Palaeontographica, Abteilung A'', 83:61-98. Hunt and Lucas (1991) mistakenly referred to ''

Francosuchus angustifrons ''Paleorhinus'' (Greek: ''"Old Nose"'') is an extinct genus of widespread basal (phylogenetics), basal phytosaur known from the Late Triassic (late Carnian stage). The genus was named in 1904 based on the type species ''Paleorhinus bransoni'', wh ...

'' as ''Ebrachosuchus angustifrons'', and considered it and the other two ''

Francosuchus ''Francosuchus'' is a dubious genus of probably basal phytosaur known from the Late Triassic (late Carnian stage) of Bavaria, southern Germany. It was named by Oskar Kuhn in 1933 and the type species is ''Francosuchus broilii''. In the same art ...

'' species, '' F. broilii'' and '' F. latus'', to be synonyms of ''E. neukami''. Furthermore, they reassigned the species to ''

Paleorhinus ''Paleorhinus'' (Greek: ''"Old Nose"'') is an extinct genus of widespread basal (phylogenetics), basal phytosaur known from the Late Triassic (late Carnian stage). The genus was named in 1904 based on the type species ''Paleorhinus bransoni'', wh ...

'', and synonymized ''Ebrachosuchus'' with the former.Hunt, A. P., and Lucas, S. G. (1991)
The ''Paleorhinus'' biochron and the correlation of the non-marine Upper Triassic of Pangaea
''Palaeontology'' 34(2):487-501. Subsequent researches accepted this referral. More recently, a phylogenetic analysis found ''E. neukami'' to be more closely related to Mystriosuchinae than to ''Paleorhinus'' and thus the genus ''Ebrachosuchus'' was re-validated, while ''F. angustifrons'' was reassigned as ''P. angustifrons'' as it shares unique synapomorphies with the type species of ''Paleorhinus'' (''P. bransoni'') and was found to be its

sister taxon In phylogenetics, a sister group or sister taxon, also called an adelphotaxon, comprises the closest relative(s) of another given unit in an evolutionary tree. Definition The expression is most easily illustrated by a cladogram: Taxon A and ...

. ''F. broilii'' and ''F. latus'' were also removed from ''E. neukami'', as they were found to be nomina dubia.

References

Phytosaurs Prehistoric reptile genera Late Triassic reptiles of Europe Triassic Germany Fossils of Germany Fossil taxa described in 1936 Taxa named by Oskar Kuhn {{triassic-reptile-stub