Gekkonomorpha

Gekkonomorpha or Pan-Gekkota is a clade of lizards that includes geckos and their closest relatives. Although it was first named in 1900, Gekkonomorpha was not widely used as a formal taxon until it was given a phylogenetic definition in the 1990s. Under this definition, Gekkonomorpha is a stem-based taxon containing the node-based taxon Gekkota, the group that includes the last common ancestor of all living geckos and its descendants. The extent of Gekkonomorpha beyond gekkotans differs between studies. For example, Lee (1998) defined Gekkonomorpha in such a way that it included not only Gekkota but the legless amphisbaenian and dibamid lizards as well. The phylogenetic analysis of Conrad (2008), which did not support a close relationship between geckos and legless lizards, used Gekkonomorpha in a much more restrictive sense so that it included only Gekkota and a few extinct lizards more closely related to Gekkota than to any other living group of lizards. Gobekko has been recovered within and outside of Gekkonomorpha.

Gekkonomorpha

Robert Michniewicz · CC BY 3.0 · via Wikipedia/Commons. May be a photograph of a specimen, or an artist’s reconstruction — an interpretation of a skeleton, since colour and soft tissue are almost never preserved.

On record

Recorded, not inferred
Sits inside
SquamataPBDB
Motility
actively mobilePBDB, for Osteichthyes
Environment
terrestrialPBDB, for Amniota

Time the record covers

At least 165 million years on record.

The record covers at least 165.3 Mya to 11.7 ka. No occurrence read is dated outside 168.2 Mya to 0 Mya.

Middle Jurassic — about 2 of 218 occurrencesLate Jurassic — about 1 of 218 occurrencesLate JurassicEarly Cretaceous — about 5 of 218 occurrencesEarly CretaceousLate Cretaceous — about 8 of 218 occurrencesLate CretaceousPaleocene — about 2 of 218 occurrencesEocene — about 44 of 218 occurrencesEoceneOligocene — about 8 of 218 occurrencesMiocene — about 46 of 218 occurrencesMiocenePliocene — about 8 of 218 occurrencesPleistocene — about 24 of 218 occurrences172–166 Mya — about 2 occurrences166–160 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences154–149 Mya — about 1 occurrence149–143 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences143–137 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences137–132 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences132–126 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences126–120 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences120–114 Mya — about 2 occurrences114–109 Mya — about 1 occurrence109–103 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences103–97 Mya — about 2 occurrences97–92 Mya — about 2 occurrences92–86 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences86–80 Mya — about 0.9 occurrences80–74 Mya — about 2 occurrences74–69 Mya — about 1 occurrence69–63 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences63–57 Mya — about 1 occurrence57–51 Mya — about 7 occurrences51–46 Mya — about 6 occurrences46–40 Mya — about 7 occurrences40–34 Mya — about 23 occurrences34–29 Mya — about 5 occurrences29–23 Mya — about 6 occurrences23–17 Mya — about 15 occurrences17–11 Mya — about 23 occurrences11–5.7 Mya — about 7 occurrences5.7–0 Mya — about 103 occurrences165.3 Mya11.7 ka172 Mya0 Mya

218 occurrences of Gekkonomorpha on record. The Paleobiology Database records this as a living group. Bar height is expected occurrences, not a count: each fossil is spread across the span it is dated to, so a tall narrow bar means tight dating and a low wide one means loose.

When

218 occurrences

These are dates about fossils, not the animal: the record can only begin after it arose and end before it died out, so either end may reach further. Shares are expected occurrences: a fossil dated to a span is counted partly in each period it straddles. More on what this infers.

Found in

40 formations

Perriere — 44.35°N, 1.73°EPerriere — 44.37°N, 1.73°EPerrière — 44.37°N, 1.73°EPerrière — 44.38°N, 1.43°ECollegats — 42.25°N, 1.08°EFriars — 32.90°N, 117.10°WBannockburn — 44.91°S, 169.86°EVarswater — 32.98°S, 18.15°EÖösh — 44.24°N, 102.73°EDzunbain — 42.45°N, 102.42°EJbel Guersif — 31.61°N, 5.66°WTienen — 50.82°N, 5.10°EQuercy Phosphorites — 44.27°N, 1.63°EEl Mamey — 19.45°N, 70.70°Wfacies à Congeria — 45.05°N, 7.93°ELegetet — 0.18°S, 35.27°EForest Marble — 51.87°N, 1.27°WTwo Medicine — 47.81°N, 112.18°WBissekty — 42.12°N, 62.66°EKhodzhakul — 40.10°N, 65.80°EIlek — 55.90°N, 87.96°EArgiles d'lignite du Soissonnais — 49.33°N, 2.66°EDjadokhta — 44.16°N, 103.69°ESilveirinha — 40.01°N, 8.82°WPerfugas — 40.72°N, 9.10°EWiesbaden — 50.04°N, 8.27°E

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The named rock units Gekkonomorpha has been recovered from, largest first. Drawn where the rock is now, not where it formed. 16 further formations hold fewer occurrences each and are not listed. 157 occurrences have no formation on record, which is common for older literature.

Found in the same rock

2,833 taxa

The Paleobiology Database records 162 sites for Gekkonomorpha, and this reads all of them. The number is how many of those sites it was catalogued from too. The 24 sharing the most are listed.

This is not a list of everything alive at the time. It is only what has come out of the same ground as this animal and been written down.

Entered from

105 references

Each of the 218 occurrences read was entered from one of these publications, ordered by how many each accounts for. This is not a search for papers mentioning the name. 93 further references are not listed. Entries link to doi.org where the Paleobiology Database holds an identifier, and to its own record where it does not. Relayed as the Paleobiology Database holds them, not checked against what they resolve to.

Media and terms

Media content1

Picture of Gekkonomorpha

Credit
Robert Michniewicz
Licence
CC BY 3.0
Commercial use
the licence allows it

No 3D scan of Gekkonomorpha was found in MorphoSource and Sketchfab.

Smithsonian Open Access was not reached for this taxon, so this list is what the others held rather than everything there is.

The description on this site

Licence
CC BY-SA 4.0

This is what the site found, which is not the same as what exists.

Keep going

What may have been alongside itSquamata through timeThe world it lived on

Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0.