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Plesiosauria (plesiosaur)

Reptilia - Plesiosauria

Taxonomy
Plesiosauria was named by de Blainville (1835). It was considered monophyletic by Gasparini et al. (2002).

It was reranked as the subclass Plesiosauria by Gadow (1898), Perrier (1928); it was reranked as the suborder Plesiosauria by Osborn (1904), Andrews (1910), Roxo (1937), Kuhn (1946), Delair (1960), Antunes (1964), Kuhn (1966), Welles and Gregg (1971), Thurmond and Jones (1981), Wiffen and Moisley (1986), Bardet et al. (1991), O'Keefe (2004), Hiller and Mannering (2005), Gasparini et al. (2015); it was reranked as the suborder Plesiosauri by Jaekel (1910), Jaekel (1911); it was reranked as the suborder Plesiosaurida by Kuhn (1971); it was reranked as the unranked clade Plesiosauria by Storrs (1997), Nicholls and Meckert (2002), Hiller et al. (2005), Gasparini et al. (2007), Previtera and González Riga (2008), Otero et al. (2009), O'Gorman (2012), Otero et al. (2012), Mateus et al. (2012), Vincent and Benson (2012), O'Gorman and Gasparini (2013), O'Gorman et al. (2013), Otero and O'Gorman (2013), Gasparini and O'Gorman (2014), Benson and Druckenmiller (2014), O'Gorman et al. (2014), Otero et al. (2014), Otero et al. (2015), Araújo et al. (2015), Novas et al. (2015), O'Gorman et al. (2015), O'Gorman et al. (2015), Otero et al. (2016), Sachs et al. (2017), Serratos et al. (2017), Wintrich et al. (2017), O'Gorman et al. (2018), Otero et al. (2018), O'Gorman (2019), O'Gorman et al. (2019), Páramo-Fonseca et al. (2019), Vincent and Storrs (2019), Vincent et al. (2019), O'Gorman (2020), O’Gorman et al. (2020), Roberts et al. (2020), Meza-Velez and O'Gorman (2021), O'Gorman (2021), Otero and Soto-Acuña (2021), O'Gorman (2022), Moyano-Paz et al. (2022), O'Gorman et al. (2023), Zverkov et al. (2023), Clark et al. (2024), Otero (2024).

It was assigned to Synapsida by Osborn (1903); to Sauropterygii by Jaekel (1910), Jaekel (1911); to Catacritosauria by Hay (1930); to Sauropterygia by Osborn (1904), Andrews (1910), Roxo (1937), Kuhn (1946), Delair (1960), Antunes (1964), Kuhn (1966), Kuhn (1971), Thurmond and Jones (1981), Carroll (1988), Bardet et al. (1991); to Eusauropterygia by Rieppel (1994), Storrs (1997); to Reptilia by Gadow (1898), Hay (1902), Perrier (1928), Sepkoski (2002); to Pistosauria by O'Keefe (2001), Fabbri et al. (2013), Benson and Druckenmiller (2014); to Eosauropterygia by Araújo et al. (2015); to Sauropterygia by Welles and Gregg (1971), Wiffen and Moisley (1986), Hiller and Mannering (2005), Gasparini et al. (2015); to Diapsida by Otero et al. (2012), Wintrich et al. (2017); to Sauropterygia by Brown (1981), Gasparini and Goñi (1985), Gasparini and Salgado (2000), Fostowicz-Frelik and Gazdzicki (2001), Cruickshank and Fordyce (2002), Hiller and Mannering (2004), O'Gorman and Varela (2010), O'Gorman et al. (2011), Otero et al. (2013), O'Gorman et al. (2013), Hiller et al. (2014), O'Gorman (2015), Araujo et al. (2015), O'Gorman et al. (2016), O'Gorman (2016), O'Gorman (2016), O'Gorman et al. (2017), O'Gorman and Coria (2017), O'Gorman et al. (2018), O’Gorman et al. (2018), O'Gorman et al. (2019), Miller et al. (2020), O'Gorman et al. (2021), Marx et al. (2021), O'Gorman and Otero (2023); to Sauropterygia by Nicholls and Meckert (2002), Gasparini et al. (2002), Hiller et al. (2005), Druckenmiller and Russell (2006), Gasparini et al. (2007), Salgado et al. (2007), Previtera and González Riga (2008), O'Keefe (2008), Otero et al. (2009), O'Gorman (2012), Mateus et al. (2012), Vincent and Benson (2012), O'Gorman and Gasparini (2013), O'Gorman et al. (2013), Otero and O'Gorman (2013), Gasparini and O'Gorman (2014), Otero et al. (2014), O'Gorman et al. (2014), O'Gorman et al. (2014), Otero et al. (2014), Otero et al. (2015), Novas et al. (2015), O'Gorman et al. (2015), O'Gorman et al. (2015), Otero et al. (2016), Hiller et al. (2017), Sachs et al. (2017), Serratos et al. (2017), O'Gorman et al. (2018), Otero et al. (2018), O'Gorman (2019), O'Gorman et al. (2019), Páramo-Fonseca et al. (2019), Vincent and Storrs (2019), Vincent et al. (2019), O'Gorman (2020), O’Gorman et al. (2020), Zverkov and Pervushov (2020), Roberts et al. (2020), O'Gorman et al. (2021), Meza-Velez and O'Gorman (2021), O'Gorman (2021), Otero and Soto-Acuña (2021), O'Gorman (2022), Moyano-Paz et al. (2022), O'Gorman et al. (2023), Zverkov et al. (2023), Ceballos-Izquierdo et al. (2023), Clark et al. (2024), Otero (2024); and to Sauropterygia by Osborn (1903), Gasparini (1997), Lazo and Cichowolski (2003), Martinelli and Forasiepi (2004), O'Keefe (2004), Druckenmiller and Russell (2008), Gomez-Perez and Noe (2011), Smith (2015), O'Gorman (2016), Smith and Araújo (2017), O'Gorman et al. (2018), O’Gorman et al. (2024).

Subtaxa
Aptychodon, Aptychodon cretaceus, Bathyspondylus, Cimoliasaurus lissaensis, Cimoliasaurus teplicensis, Cimoliosaurus nazarowi, Discosaurus planior, Elasmosaurus intermedius, Elasmosaurus orientalis, Embaphias, Embaphias circulosus, Eoplesiosaurus, Eretmosaurus, Gymocetus, Hexatarsostinus, Hunosaurus fasseli, Iserosaurus littoralis, Lindwurmia, Lutkesaurus, Mauisaurus brachiolatus, Megalneusaurus, Namuncurania, Neoplesiosauria, Nothosaurops, Oligosimus, Oligosimus grandaevus, Orophosaurus, Orophosaurus pauciporus, Peloneustes kanzleri, Piptomerus, Piptomerus hexagonus, Piptomerus megaloporus, Piptomerus microporus, Piratosaurus, Piratosaurus plicatus, Plesiosauriformes, Plesiosauroidea (syn. Dolichodeira), Plesiosaurus affinis, Plesiosaurus australis, Plesiosaurus balticus, Plesiosaurus bernardi, Plesiosaurus brachistospondylus, Plesiosaurus brevifemur, Plesiosaurus brevis, Plesiosaurus continuus, Plesiosaurus cycnodeirus, Plesiosaurus degenhardti, Plesiosaurus ellipsospondylus, Plesiosaurus euryspondylus, Plesiosaurus gouldii, Plesiosaurus hexagonalis, Plesiosaurus infraplanus, Plesiosaurus latispinus, Plesiosaurus levis, Plesiosaurus lockwoodii, Plesiosaurus megapleuron, Plesiosaurus microdeirus, Plesiosaurus mudgei, Plesiosaurus neocomiensis, Plesiosaurus nordmanni, Plesiosaurus ophiodeirus, Plesiosaurus pachyomus, Plesiosaurus phillipsi (syn. Plesiosaurus carinatus), Plesiosaurus planispondylus, Plesiosaurus planus, Plesiosaurus planus trigonalis, Plesiosaurus platydeirus, Plesiosaurus poecilospondylus, Plesiosaurus shirleyensis, Plesiosaurus subdepressus, Plesiosaurus traversii, Plesiosaurus truncatus, Plesiosaurus validus, Plesiosaurus winspitensis, Pliosauroidea (syn. Brachydeira), Pliosaurus planus, Plistosauroidea, Polycotylus donicus, Polycotylus epigurgitis, Polycotylus orientalis, Polycotylus tenuis, Polycotylus ultimus, Polyptychodon, Polyptychodon neocomiensis, Rhaeticosaurus, Rhomaleosauridae (syn. Thaumatosauridae), Scarrisaurus, Stereosaurus cratynotus, Stereosaurus platyomus, Stereosaurus stenomus, Stratesaurus, Sulmosaurus, Taphrosaurus, Teleosaurus neogaeus, Uronautes, Uronautes cetiformis, Xenopsaria, Zahrisaurus