Marmoretta
| Marmoretta Temporal range: Middle-Late Jurassic
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| Skull of Marmoretta | |
Scientific classification 
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| Domain: | Eukaryota |
| Kingdom: | Animalia |
| Phylum: | Chordata |
| Class: | Reptilia |
| Clade: | Lepidosauromorpha |
| Genus: | †Marmoretta Evans, 1991 |
| Type species | |
| †Marmoretta oxoniensis Evans, 1991
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Marmoretta is an
lepidosauromorph reptile known from the Middle Jurassic (Bathonian) of Britain, as well as the Late Jurassic of Portugal. It contains a single species, Marmoretta oxoniensis.[1][2]
Etymology
Marmoretta was first described and named by
generic name is derived from Latin marmoros, meaning "Marble" and refers to the Forest Marble Formation - the source of the initial specimens of Marmoretta. The specific name is derived from Oxonia, the Latinised form of "Oxford", in reference to Oxfordshire.[1]
Discovery
Marmoretta is known from
parabasisphenoid.[3] Remains have also been reported from the Alcobaça Formation in Portugal, dating to the Late Jurassic.[1]
Description
Marmoretta was a small reptile, with a maximum skull length of about 4 centimetres (1.6 in).[1] The dentiton is subpleurodont.[3]
Phylogeny
Susan E. Evans and Magdalena Borsuk−Białynicka (2009) performed a
phylogenetic analysis that recovered Sophineta as the sister group of Lepidosauria. The inclusion of Sophineta displaced the relictual Middle Jurassic Marmoretta and gave the origin of Lepidosauria much older age. The cladogram below follows their results.[4] Some subsequent phylogenies have recovered Marmoretta as a stem-squamate, closer to squamates than to rhynchocephalians.[5][6] In the 2021 redescription, it was found to be a basal lepidosauromorph, most closely related to Fraxinisaura from the Middle Triassic of Germany.[3]
Cladogram after Griffiths, 2021:
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References
- ^ .
- ^ .
- ^ S2CID 239140732.
- ^ Susan E. Evans and Magdalena Borsuk−Białynicka (2009). "A small lepidosauromorph reptile from the Early Triassic of Poland" (PDF). Paleontologica Polonica. 65: 179–202.
- S2CID 44108416.
- PMID 32080209.