Odontocyclops

Odontocyclops
Temporal range: Late Permian
Skull in Iziko South African Museum
Scientific classification Edit this classification
Domain: Eukaryota
Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Chordata
Clade: Synapsida
Clade: Therapsida
Suborder: †Anomodontia
Clade: †Dicynodontia
Clade: †Cryptodontia
Genus: †Odontocyclops
Keyser and Cruickshank 1979
Type species
Odontocyclops whaitsi
(Broom 1913)

Odontocyclops (Greek: ondont “tooth” Greek: kyklops “round eye”, a kind of Greek mythological giant with one eye in the midline; "toothy cyclops")[1] is an extinct genus of Dicynodonts that lived in the Late Permian. Dicynodonts are believed to be the first major assemblage of terrestrial herbivores.[2] Fossils of Odontocyclops have been found in the Karoo Basin of South Africa and the Luangwa Valley of Zambia.[2] The phylogenetic classification of Odontocyclops has been long under debate, but most current research places them as their own genus of Dicynodonts and being very closely related to Rhachiocephalus and Oudenodon.[2]

  1. ^ Cite error: The named reference Key1979 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  2. ^ a b c Angielczyk, K. D. 2002. Redescription, phylogenetic position, and stratigraphic significance of the dicynodont genus Odontocyclops (Synap-sida: Anomodontia). Journal of Paleontology 76:1047–1059.