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Image credits: Tyler Keillor (sculpture) and Ximena Erickson
(original photography); modified by Bonnie Miljour. |
Klein et al. (2017) note that fossil snakes are well represented in the Upper Cretaceous of northern Africa (99.7 to 94.3 MYA), with material known from Morocco, Sudan, Egypt, Libya, Algeria, and Niger. The Moroccan Kem Kem beds have yielded a particularly diverse snake assemblage, with members of the families Simoliophiidae, Madtsoiidae, ?Nigerophiidae and several unnamed taxa co-occurring. These fossils are important for our understanding of the early evolutionary history of snakes, and may shed light on the ecology and initial diversification of basal snakes. Klien and colleagues (2017) describe a new taxon,
Norisophis begaa, from the Kem Kem beds of Begaa, at at Aferdou N'Chaft, in southeast Morocco. Although known only from vertebrae, the unique appearance of the fossils adds to our knowledge regarding the early history the snake fauna of the northern Africa's Late Cretaceous. The vertebrae are characterised by a marked interzygapophyseal constriction, parazygantral foramina, an incipient prezygapophyseal process, and an anterio-posteriorly short centrum. Several characteristics shared with
Najash,
Seismophis, Madtsoiidae, and
Coniophis suggest that
Norisophis is a stem ophidian.
N. begaa further increases the diversity and disparity of snakes within the Kem Kem beds, supporting the hypothesis that Africa was a mid-Cretaceous hotspot for snake diversity.
Citation
Klein CG, Longrich NR, Ibrahim N, Zouhri S, Martill DM. 2017. A new basal snake from the mid-Cretaceous of Morocco.
Cretaceous Research. 2017 Apr 30;72:134-41.
