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Purbicella ragei
Taxonomy
Purbicella ragei was named by Evans et al. (2012). Its type specimen is BGS GSb581, a skull (Articulated skull preserved in ventral view), and it is a 3D body fossil. Its type locality is Purbicella type, Durlston Bay (PROXY), which is in a Berriasian marginal marine shale in the Lulworth Formation of the United Kingdom. It is the type species of Purbicella.
Synonymy list
| Year | Name and author |
|---|---|
| 2012 | Purbicella ragei Evans et al. p. 518 fig. 1–3 |
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If no rank is listed, the taxon is considered an unranked clade in modern classifications. Ranks may be repeated or presented in the wrong order because authors working on different parts of the classification may disagree about how to rank taxa.
†Purbicella ragei Evans et al. 2012
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Diagnosis
| Reference | Diagnosis | |
|---|---|---|
| S. E. Evans et al. 2012 | Small lizard (skull length ~ 22 mm) that differs from other named Purbeck taxa in the possession of an unpaired frontal that is emarginated between the orbits; resembles Paramacellodus, Parasaurillus and Saurillus, but differs from Becklesius, Dorsetisaurus, Durotrigia, Parviraptor, and Pseudosaurillus, in having a relatively unspecialized tooth morphology [Evans and Searle, 2002]; differs from Paramacellodus and Parasaurillus in lacking sculpture on the maxilla (unknown in Saurillus); resembles Paramacellodus in having an edentulous anterior process on the maxilla, retention of the lacrimal, separate postorbital and postfrontal bones, and a postorbital with a reduced entry into the orbital margin, but differs in lacking a wide medial flange on the maxilla, having a less extensive maxillary-nasal overlap, having a pterygoid with a much smaller flange, greater curvature of the quadrate process, and larger teeth in a single row, and in having a postfrontal that is almost excluded from the upper temporal fenestra by the postorbital; differs from Parasaurillus in lacking a sharp disparity in the size and diameter of the premaxillary and anterior maxillary teeth in relation to more posterior teeth and in fusion of the frontals. Of those Jurassic-Cretaceous fossil lizards known to have unpaired frontals in the adult: differs from Meyasaurus (Lower Cretaceous, Spain [Evans and Barbadillo, 1997]) in lacking the strong interorbital constriction that characterizes that genus; differs from Dalinghosaurus (Lower Creta- ceous, China [Evans and Wang, 2005]) in having more, smaller teeth, retention of a lacrimal, absence of sculpture on the maxilla and postorbital process of the jugal and presence of a posterior jugal spur, and in the possession of a broader, shallower quadrate; and differs from Huehuecuetzpalli (Lower Cretaceous, Mexico [Reynoso, 1998]) in lacking a long premaxillary rostrum, reduced postfrontal, and marked expansion at the frontoparietal junction. The condition of the frontals is unknown in Tepexisaurus (Lower Cretaceous, Mexico [Reynoso and Callison, 2000]), but it differs from Purbicella in many characters including: a wider premaxilla (up to 13 teeth), a larger lateral ectopterygoid head (probably excluding maxilla from suborbital fenestra), blunt rather than tapering posterior maxillary teeth, a transverse rather than arched frontoparietal suture without parietal tabs, separation of jugal and squamosal, no posterior jugal process, a partially closed rather than open upper temporal fenestra, and no pterygoid teeth. |