Archelosauria

Archelosaurs
Temporal range: 260–0 Ma Possible Capitanian records.
Proganochelys quenstedti
Scientific classification Edit this classification
Domain: Eukaryota
Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Chordata
Class: Reptilia
Clade: Sauria
Clade: Archelosauria
Crawford et al., 2015[1]
Subgroups

Archelosauria is a clade grouping turtles and archosaurs (birds and crocodilians) and their fossil relatives, to the exclusion of lepidosaurs (the clade containing lizards, snakes and the tuatara). The majority of phylogenetic analyses based on molecular data (e.g. DNA and proteins) have supported a sister-group relationship between turtles and archosaurs. On the other hand, Archelosauria had not been historically supported by most morphological analyses, which have instead found turtles to either be descendants of parareptiles, early-diverging diapsids outside of Sauria, or close relatives of lepidosaurs within the clade Ankylopoda. Some recent morphological analyses have also found support for Archelosauria.

  1. ^ Cite error: The named reference Crawford2015 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).