The Coal Measures Amphibia of North America

by Roy Lee Moodie

[CHAPTER IX.]

THE AMERICAN COAL MEASURES BRANCHIOSAURIDÆ.

Definition Op the Family Branchiosauridæ Fritsch, 1879. Coal Measures and Permian Op North America and Europe.

Fritsch, Fauna der Gaskohle, Bd. I, p. 69, fig. 30, 1879.

Lydekker, Cat. Fossil Reptilia and Amphibia, pt. IV, p. 210, 1890 (Protritonidæ;).

Stegocephalic, salamander-like animals, with broad, anteriorly truncate skull. Teeth smooth with large pulp-cavity. The parasphenoid narrowed anteriorly, posteriorly expanded to a shield-shaped plate. Vertebra; with the notochord persistent and intravertebrally expanded. Pelvis well developed, the ilium and ischium osseous with large cartilaginous margins, the pubis unknown, possibly hyaline cartilage. Ribs short, straight, present on almost all vertebræ. Skin with delicately ornamented scales. Eyes with sclerotic plates. Palatal elements toothless or with small tooth-like tubercles on pterygoids and palatines. Ventral armature on throat, chest, and abdomen, extending on to the limbs, consisting of small delicate scutellæ arranged in a chevron pattern.

The above definition is modified from Fritsch (Fauna der Gaskohle, Bd. I, p. 69, 1879).

The North American species are: (?) Sparodus sp. indet. Dawson, Micrerpeton caudatum Moodie, Mazonerpeton longicaudatum Moodie, Mazonerpeton costatum Moodie, Eumicrerpeton parvum Moodie.

Genus MICRERPETON Moodie.

Moodie, Jour. Geol., 17, p. 39, figs. 1 to 6, 1909.