''Trematochampsa'' is a

dubious Doubt is a mental state in which the mind remains suspended between two or more contradictory propositions, unable to be certain of any of them. Doubt on an emotional level is indecision between belief and disbelief. It may involve uncertainty ...

extinct Extinction is the termination of a kind of organism or of a group of kinds (taxon), usually a species. The moment of extinction is generally considered to be the death of the last individual of the species, although the capacity to breed and ...

genus Genus ( plural genera ) is a taxonomic rank used in the biological classification of extant taxon, living and fossil organisms as well as Virus classification#ICTV classification, viruses. In the hierarchy of biological classification, genus com ...

crocodyliform Crocodyliformes is a clade of crurotarsan archosaurs, the group often traditionally referred to as "crocodilians". They are the first members of Crocodylomorpha to possess many of the features that define later relatives. They are the only pseudo ...

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 ...

(

Coniacian The Coniacian is an age or stage in the geologic timescale. It is a subdivision of the Late Cretaceous Epoch or Upper Cretaceous Series and spans the time between 89.8 ± 1 Ma and 86.3 ± 0.7 Ma (million years ago). The Coniacian is preceded by t ...

Santonian The Santonian is an age in the geologic timescale or a chronostratigraphic stage. It is a subdivision of the Late Cretaceous Epoch or Upper Cretaceous Series. It spans the time between 86.3 ± 0.7 mya (million years ago) and 83.6 ± 0.7 mya. The ...

age)

In Beceten Formation The In Beceten Formation, also Beceten or Ibecten is a Coniacian to Santonian geologic formation in the Iullemmeden Basin of Niger. Dinosaur remains are among the fossils that have been recovered from the formation, although none have yet been re ...

Niger ) , official_languages = , languages_type = National languagestype 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 specimen ...

, ''T. taqueti'', was described by

Eric Buffetaut The given name Eric, Erich, Erikk, Erik, Erick, or Eirik is derived from the Old Norse name ''Eiríkr'' (or ''Eríkr'' in Old East Norse due to monophthongization). The first element, ''ei-'' may be derived from the older Proto-Norse ''* ain ...

in 1974. A second species, ''T. oblita'', was named from

Madagascar Madagascar (; mg, Madagasikara, ), officially the Republic of Madagascar ( mg, Repoblikan'i Madagasikara, links=no, ; french: République de Madagascar), is an island country in the Indian Ocean, approximately off the coast of East Africa ...

in 1979, but was renamed ''

Miadanasuchus ''Miadanasuchus'' is an extinct genus of peirosaurid which existed in the Maevarano Formation of Madagascar during the late Cretaceous period (Campanian The Campanian is the fifth of six ages of the Late Cretaceous Epoch on the geologic t ...

'' in 2009. ''Trematochampsa'' gives its name to the

Trematochampsidae Trematochampsidae is an extinct family of mesoeucrocodylian crocodylomorphs. Fossils are present from Madagascar, Morocco, Niger, Argentina, and Brazil (in the case of '' Caririsuchus'', where some specimens have been found in the Romualdo Memb ...

, a poorly known group of fossil crocodiles. However, the labile phylogenetic position of ''Trematochampsa'' in many studies has been attributed to character conflict, leading many authors to exclude this genus from many cladistic analyses, but Sertich et al. (2014) noted that the referred material of ''Trematochampsa'' consists of more than one crocodyliform taxon, so they opted to use only the cranial material in the dataset for the cladistic analysis of ''

Rukwasuchus ''Rukwasuchus'' is an extinct genus of peirosaurid mesoeucrocodylian known from the middle Cretaceous Galula Formation of southwestern Tanzania. It contains a single species, ''Rukwasuchus yajabalijekundu''. Discovery ''Rukwasuchus'' is known fr ...

'' and recommended removing the postcranial material from ''Trematochampsa''. The analysis recovered ''Trematochampsa'' as a member of Peirosauridae, rendering Trematochampsidae a junior synonym of Peirosauridae. A 2018 revision of ''T. taqueti'' found that its fossil material was a mixture of bones from peirosaurids, ''

Araripesuchus ''Araripesuchus'' is a genus of extinct crocodyliform that existed during the Cretaceous period of the late Mesozoic era some 125 to 66 million years ago. Six species of ''Araripesuchus'' are currently known. They are generally considered to be n ...

'', ''

Anatosuchus ''Anatosuchus'' ("duck crocodile", the name from the Latin ''anas'' ("duck") and the Greek ''souchos'' ("crocodile"), for the broad, duck-like snout) is an extinct genus of notosuchian crocodylomorph discovered in Gadoufaoua, Niger, and described ...

'', ''

Notosuchus ''Notosuchus'' (; 'southern crocodile') is an extinct genus of South American notosuchian crocodylomorph. It was terrestrial, living approximately 85 million years ago in the Santonian stage of the Late Cretaceous. Description ''Notosuchus'' wa ...

''-like crocodyliforms, and

neosuchia Neosuchia is a clade within Mesoeucrocodylia that includes all modern extant crocodilians and their closest fossil relatives. It is defined as the most inclusive clade containing all crocodylomorphs more closely related to ''Crocodylus niloticus' ...

ns. No distinguishing characteristics were found in the holotype specimen, a

lacrimal bone The lacrimal bone is a small and fragile bone of the facial skeleton; it is roughly the size of the little fingernail. It is situated at the front part of the medial wall of the orbit. It has two surfaces and four borders. Several bony landmarks of ...

, thus rendering the genus a ''nomen dubium''.

References

* Carroll, RL. (1988). ''Vertebrate Paleontology and Evolution''. W.H. Freeman and Company

External links

''Trematochampsa'' in the Paleobiology Database
Late Cretaceous crocodylomorphs of Africa Taxa named by Éric Buffetaut Prehistoric pseudosuchian genera Cretaceous Niger Coniacian genus first appearances Santonian genus extinctions {{paleo-archosaur-stub