Mawsonia (fish)

Mawsonia Temporal range: Ma PreꞒ Ꞓ O S D C P T J K Pg N
Skeleton of Mawsonia gigas, showing estimated size of largest known individual
Scientific classification
Domain:	Eukaryota
Kingdom:	Animalia
Phylum:	Chordata
Clade:	Sarcopterygii
Class:	Actinistia
Order:	Coelacanthiformes
Family:	†Mawsoniidae
Genus:	†Mawsonia Woodward, 1907
Species
M. brasiliensis Yabumoto, 2002 M. gigas Woodward, 1907 (type) M. minor? Woodward, 1908 M. libyca? Weiler, 1935 M. soba Brito, 2018 M. tegamensis Wenz, 1975 M. ubangiensis? Casier, 1961

Mawsonia is an

The fish has six fins: two on the top of the body, two on the sides, one at the end of its tail and one at the bottom of its tail. Rather than having teeth, the inside of the mouth was covered in small (1-2 mm) denticles.^[4] It reached at least 3.5 m (11 ft) in length, although one specimen possibly exceeded 5 m (16 ft), only rivaled by the related Trachymetopon.^[5][6][2]

Taxonomy

The genus was named by Arthur Smith Woodward in 1907, from specimens found in the Early Cretaceous (Hauterivian) aged Ilhas Group of Bahia, Brazil.

Fossils have been found on three continents; in South America they have been found in the

The type species is Mawsonia gigas, named and described in 1907. Numerous distinct species have been described since then. M. brasiliensis, M. libyca, M. minor, and M. ubangiensis have all been proposed to be synonyms of M. gigas,[6]^[9] although Léo Fragoso's 2014 thesis on mawsoniids^[10] finds M. brasiliensis valid and cautions against synonymizing M. minor without further examination. Several recent publications consider M. brasiliensis to be valid as well.^{[9][11][12][13]} Although initially considered to belong to this genus, "Mawsonia" lavocati is most likely referable to Axelrodichthys instead.^[13][14]

Ecology

Mawsonia was native to freshwater and brackish ecosystems.