Anapsids | |
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Anapsid skull | |
Scientific classification | |
Domain: | Eukaryota |
Kingdom: | Animalia |
Phylum: | Chordata |
Class: | Reptilia |
Informal group: | Anapsida Williston, 1917 |
Subgroups | |
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An anapsid is an amniote whose skull lacks one or more skull openings (fenestra, or fossae) near the temples.[1] Traditionally, the Anapsida are considered the most primitive subclass of amniotes, the ancestral stock from which Synapsida and Diapsida evolved, making anapsids paraphyletic. It is, however, doubtful that all anapsids lack temporal fenestra as a primitive trait, and that all the groups traditionally seen as anapsids truly lacked fenestra.