Priscagamidae

Priscagamidae is an extinct family of iguanian lizards known from the Late Cretaceous of Mongolia and China and the Eocene of India, spanning a range from 83.6 to 48.6 million years ago. Probably the earliest priscagamids on indeterminate genera were found in Aptian-Albian sediments in "Hobur", Mongolia. It includes the genera Heterodontagama, Mimeosaurus, Phrynosomimus, Priscagama, and possibly Pleurodontagama. The first fossils of priscagamids were found in the Djadochta and Khermeen Tsav formations of Mongolia. More recently they have been found in the Cambay Formation in India, leading to the naming of Heterodontagama in 2013. Priscagamidae was originally described as a subfamily of Agamidae called Priscagaminae in 1984, but it was reclassified as a distinct family in 1989. Most phylogenetic analyses still find a close relationship between Priscagamidae and Agamidae, although a 2015 study found it to be basal to all other iguanian clades, warranting its removal from Iguania and placement in a larger clade called Iguanomorpha.

No picture of Priscagamidae was found. Wikipedia, Wikidata, iDigBio and Smithsonian Open Access were searched and had none. GBIF was asked, and what came back is not recorded: nothing, or a picture this site could not tie to Priscagamidae, or no answer at all. This entry cannot say which.

On record

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

Time the record covers

At least 54 million years on record.

The record covers at least 110.1 Mya to 56 Mya. No occurrence read is dated outside 119.57 Mya to 48.07 Mya.

Early Cretaceous — about 1 of 25 occurrencesEarly CretaceousLate Cretaceous — about 23 of 25 occurrencesLate CretaceousPaleocene — about 0 of 25 occurrencesEocene — about 1 of 25 occurrencesEocene121–119 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences119–116 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences116–114 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences114–111 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences111–109 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences84–81 Mya — about 5 occurrences81–79 Mya — about 5 occurrences79–76 Mya — about 5 occurrences76–74 Mya — about 5 occurrences74–71 Mya — about 3 occurrences57–54 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences54–52 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences52–49 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences49–47 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences110.1 Mya56 Mya121 Mya47 Mya

25 occurrences of Priscagamidae on record, most of them in the Late Cretaceous. 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

25 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

6 formations

Djadokhta — 43.66°N, 100.90°EDjadokhta — 44.20°N, 103.27°EDjadokhta — 44.00°N, 104.00°EDjadokhta — 44.16°N, 103.69°EBaruungoyot — 43.49°N, 101.15°EBaruungoyot — 43.25°N, 99.75°EBaruungoyot — 43.30°N, 99.60°EBayan Mandahu — 41.80°N, 106.74°EBayan Mandahu — 41.74°N, 107.04°EDzunbain — 42.45°N, 102.42°EDjadokhta — 41.70°N, 106.80°ECambay Shale — 21.40°N, 73.08°E

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The named rock units Priscagamidae has been recovered from, largest first. Drawn where the rock is now, not where it formed.

Priscagamidae and its relatives

Late Cretaceous

Where Priscagamidae and its relatives were recorded in the Late Cretaceous.

Found in the same rock

219 taxa

The Paleobiology Database records 16 sites for Priscagamidae, 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

11 references

Each of the 25 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. 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 content0

No picture of Priscagamidae was found. Wikipedia, Wikidata, iDigBio and Smithsonian Open Access were searched and had none.

GBIF was asked, and what came back is not recorded: nothing, or a picture this site could not tie to Priscagamidae, or no answer at all. This entry cannot say which.

No 3D scan was found. Smithsonian Open Access, MorphoSource and Sketchfab were all searched.

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 itChamaeleontiformes through timeFormations of the Late CretaceousThe world it lived on

Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0. (Borsuk-Bialynicka and Moody 1984)