Icticephalus

Icticephalus
Temporal range: Middle - Late Permian
Scientific classification Edit this classification
Domain: Eukaryota
Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Chordata
Clade: Synapsida
Clade: Therapsida
Clade: Therocephalia
Superfamily: Baurioidea
Genus: Icticephalus
Broom, 1915
Type species
Icticephalus polycynodon
Broom, 1915

Icticephalus is an extinct genus of therocephalian therapsids from the Middle and Late Permian of South Africa. The type species Icticephalus polycynodon was named from the Tapinocephalus Assemblage Zone by South African paleontologist Robert Broom in 1915.[1] Specimens of Icticephalus have also been described from the Cistecephalus Assemblage Zone. Broom originally placed Icticephalus in the Scaloposauridae, a group of very small therocephalians. Most scaloposaurids are now thought to be juvenile forms of other therocephalians, and Scaloposauridae is no longer recognized as a valid grouping. Icticephalus and other former scaloposaurids are now classified as basal members of Baurioidea.[2]

References

[edit]
  1. ^ Benton, M.J. (1983). "Dinosaur success in the Triassic: a noncompetitive ecological model". The Quarterly Review of Biology. 58 (1): 29–55. doi:10.1086/413056.
  2. ^ Huttenlocker, A. (2009). "An investigation into the cladistic relationships and monophyly of therocephalian therapsids (Amniota: Synapsida)". Zoological Journal of the Linnean Society. 157 (4): 865–891. doi:10.1111/j.1096-3642.2009.00538.x.