Palaeontologia africana

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ISSN (print): 0078-8554 ISSN (electronic): 2410-4418 For queries regarding content of Palaeontologia africana collections please contact Jonah Choiniere by email : jonah.choiniere@wits.ac.za or Tel : 011 717 6684

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    New specimens of the basal ornithischian dinosaur Lesothosaurus diagnosticus Galton, 1978 from the Early Jurassic of South Africa
    (2016-03) Barrett, Paul M.; Butler, Richard J.; Yates, Adam M.; Baron, Matthew G.; Choiniere, Jonah N.
    We describe new specimens of the basal ornithischian dinosaur Lesothosaurus diagnosticus Galton, 1978 collected from a bone bed in the Fouriesburg district of the Free State, South Africa. The material was collected from the upper Elliot Formation (Early Jurassic) and represents the remains of at least three different individuals. These individuals are larger in body size than those already known in museum collections and offer additional information on cranial ontogeny in the taxon. Moreover, they are similar in size to the sympatric taxon Stormbergia dangershoeki. The discovery of three individuals at this locality might imply group-living behaviour in this early ornithischian.
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    Stereospondyl amphibians from the Elliot Formation of South Africa
    (Bernard Price Institute for Palaeontological Research, 1999) Warren, Anne; Damiani, Ross
    This paper documents the first members of the Chigutisauridae (Amphibia, Stereospondyli) from southern Africa and the first post-Triassic stereospondyls from that region. The material, from the Lower and Upper Elliot Formation, was associated with a diverse fauna including early mammals and dinosaurs. Most temnospondyls known to have survived the Triassic are brachyopoids, with large members of the Chigutisauridae present in the Jurassic and Cretaceous of Gondwana, and smaller members of the Brachyopidae in the Jurassic of Eurasia.
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    Further material of the ceratosaurian dinosaur Syntarsus from the Elliot Formation (Early Jurassic) of South Africa
    (Bernard Price Institute for Palaeontological Research, 1999) Munyikwa, Darlington
    Two further fossils recovered from the Elliot Formation in South Africa are referred to the ceratosaurian genus Syntarsus: a partial pelvis and a well preserved and articulated snout. The pelvic fragment consists of most of the posterior end of the left ilium and sacrum, with a small part of the right ilium attached. The acetabular area and ‘brevis shelf’ of the left ilium are well preserved, as is the ventral surface of the sacrum. These parts show features characteristic of Syntarsus material from Zimbabwe. The snout has the premaxillae, maxillae, nasals and dentaries from both sides preserved, of which only the premaxillae are more or less complete. The premaxilla has four alveoli and the maxilla nine, and the maxilla bears the characteristic dimpling on its lateral surface also seen in Syntarsus material collected in Zimbabwe. The snout also possesses the characteristic small diastema or subnarial gap between the premaxillary and maxillary teeth shown by Syntarsus material from elsewhere. The snout is strongly compressed bilaterally and the jaws are tightly closed, so that the dentary teeth are obscured beneath the upper dentition. This compression has crushed the palatal region, obscuring palatal details.
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    Preliminary report of dinosaur tracks in Qwa Qwa, South Africa
    (Bernard Price Institute for Palaeontological Research, 1999) Gow, Chris E; Latimer, E M
    We record the presence of tridactyl dinosaur tracks preserved on a siltstone surface in a watercourse in a north eastern Free State game park.
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    Postcranial remains of Fabrosauridae (Reptilia: Ornithischia) from the Stormberg of southern Africa
    (Bernard Price Institute for Palaeontological Research, 1984) Santa Luca, A. P.
    The postcranial skeletons of three fabrosaurids from the upper Elliot Formation "Red Beds" of the Stormberg Group in southern Africa are described. The material demonstrates details of fabrosaurid anatomy previously unknown, particularly a short, deep prepubic process which is undoubtedly primitive for the Ornithischia. Besides the short prepubis, fabrosaurids are characterized by 1) a reduced manus; 2) an ilium having a lateral extension of the supra-acetabular margin and a deep nearly vertical brevis shelf; and 3) an elongated hindlimb. Postcranial morphology excludes the fabrosaurids from the ancestry of the contemporaneous heterodontosaurids. Neither can the fabrosaurids be considered ancestral to the 'juvenile scelidosaurid' (BMNH R6704) as has been suggested. On the contrary, the 'scelidosaurid' is more primitive in structure than fabrosaurids. The assignment of Nanosaurus agilis Marsh to the Fabrosauridae is not substantiated after morphological comparisons between the postcranial material of both. The taxonomic status of Scutellosaurus lawleri is regarded as uncertain. The fabrosaurids are more similar to the Morrison Formation camptosaurids, than to Hypsilophodon. Finally, it is argued that ornithopods were not a basal stock for the phylogenesis of non-ornithopods but represent an independent radiation comparable to the other ornithischian suborders. The fabrosaurids were an early development of the ornithopod radiation itself.
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    A review of the reptile and amphibian assemblages from the Stormberg of southern Africa, with special emphasis on the footprints and the age of the Stormberg
    (Bernard Price Institute for Palaeontological Research, 1984) Olsen, Paul E.; Galton, Peter M.
    The Molteno, Elliot, and Clarens formations comprise the continental Stormberg Group of the Karoo Basin of South Africa and Lesotho. The Molteno Formation contains a well preserved macro- and microfloral assemblage but apparently no vertebrates; the Elliot and Clarens formations contain abundant vertebrates but virtually no floral remains. The vertebrate taxa represented by skeletal remains are listed and divided into two assemblages - the lower Stormberg (lower Elliot) and upper Stormberg (upper Elliot and Clarens) assemblages. The abundant, diagnosable footprint taxa are revised and their names reduced to eight genera. These ichnotaxa also fall into two biostratigraphic zones that parallel the skeletal assemblages. Comparison of the faunal assemblages with those of the European type section strongly suggests that the lower Stormberg assemblage is Late Triassic (Carnian- Norian) in age while the upper Stormberg assemblage is Early Jurassic (Hettangian-Pliens- bachian) in age. Comparisons with other continental assemblages from other areas suggest that the upper Stormberg (upper Elliot and Clarens formations) assemblage broadly correlates with the upper Newark Supergroup of eastern North America, the Glen Canyon of the southwestern United States, and the lower Lufeng Series of China- all thought to be of Early Jurassic age on the basis of floral and/or radiometric evidence. Based on these correlations, previously published paleobiogeographic maps are revised; these show a shift from Late Triassic floral and faunal provinciality to Early Jurassic homogeneity. This shift was synchronous with a widening of the equatorial arid zone.
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    A second specimen of Blikanasaurus (Dinosauria: Sauropoda) and the biostratigraphy of the lower Elliot Formation
    (Bernard Price Institute for Palaeontological Research, university of the Witwatersrand, 2008-04) Yates, Adam M.
    A second specimen of the rare basal sauropod Blikanasaurus cromptoni, is recorded from a site in the Ladybrand district of the Eastern Free State, South Africa. The specimen consists of a right metatarsal 1 that originated from the upper 20mof the lower Elliot Formation. It can be referred to B. cromptoni on the basis of its small size and highly robust proportions, which distinguish this taxon from all other sauropodomorphs. This record extends the geographic distribution of B. cromptoni north into the region of the main Karoo Basin where the Elliot Formation is dramatically thinner. It also extends the known stratigraphic range of B. cromptoni up from the base of the Elliot Formation into a position near the top of the lower member. This new record, combined with other new discoveries, supports the hypothesis that the thin northern part of the lower Elliot Formation is a condensed section that is largely, if not entirely, coeval with the thicker southern sections.