Silesauridae

Silesaurids Temporal range: ?Middle Triassic – Late Triassic, ?245–203 Ma PreꞒ Ꞓ O S D C P T J K Pg N
Scientific classification
Domain:	Eukaryota
Kingdom:	Animalia
Phylum:	Chordata
Clade:	Ornithodira
Clade:	Dinosauromorpha
Clade:	Dinosauriformes
Clade:	Dracohors
Clade:	Dinosauria
Clade:	†Ornithischia (?)
Family:	†Silesauridae Langer et al., 2010
Subgroups
†Agnosphitys? †Asilisaurus? †Ignotosaurus †Lewisuchus? †Pisanosaurus? †Soumyasaurus? †Sulcimentisauria Martz & Small, 2019 †Amanasaurus †Diodorus? †Eucoelophysis? †Gamatavus? †Gondwanax †Kwanasaurus? †Lutungutali? †Sacisaurus? †Silesaurus †Technosaurus?

Silesauridae is an extinct family of Triassic dinosauriforms. It is most commonly considered to be a clade of non-dinosaur dinosauriforms, and the sister group of dinosaurs.^{[1][2][3][4][5]} Some studies have instead suggested that most or all silesaurids comprised an early diverging clade or a paraphyletic grade within ornithischian dinosaurs.^[6][7][8][9] Silesaurids have a consistent general body plan, with a fairly long neck and legs and possibly quadrupedal habits, but most silesaurids are heavily fragmentary nonetheless. Furthermore, they occupied a variety of ecological niches, with early silesaurids (such as Lewisuchus)^[10] being carnivorous and later taxa (such as Kwanasaurus)^[11] having adaptations for specialized herbivory. As indicated by the contents of referred coprolites, Silesaurus may have been insectivorous, feeding selectively on small beetles and other arthropods.^[12]