Whether the extinct crocodylians given the name Allognathosuchus represent a monophyletic assemblage remains controversial, and some have argued that Wannaganosuchus brachymanus Erickson, 1982 is a form of Allognathosuchus. A revised phylogenetic analysis supports a set of relationships in which the type species of Allognathosuchus (A. polyodon) is closer to Alligator than it is to European “Allognathosuchus” or “Allognathosuchus” from the North American Paleocene, and a close relationship between Allognathosuchus and Wannaganosuchus is not supported. One European fossil assigned to Allognathosuchus, A. woutersi, is similar (and possibly referable) to Diplocynodon. Chrysochampsa mlynarskii can be distinguished from all other Early Tertiary alligatoroids, but its relationships to other members of the clade (and whether it should be placed within Allognathosuchus) are unclear. These results support multiple dispersal events of alligatorines from North America to Eurasia, and suggest that the cranial anatomy thought to distinguish forms such as Allognathosuchus is plesiomorphic at the level of Alligatoridae. The name Allognathosuchus should be applied in a restricted sense to Allognathosuchus polyodon and its closest relatives, with alternative generic names applied to distantly related “Allognathosuchus.”
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1 December 2004
ALLIGATORINE PHYLOGENY AND THE STATUS OF ALLOGNATHOSUCHUS MOOK, 1921
CHRISTOPHER A. BROCHU
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Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology
Vol. 24 • No. 4
December 2004
Vol. 24 • No. 4
December 2004