Doswellia
| Doswellia Temporal range: Late Triassic,
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|---|---|
| Life restoration of Doswellia kaltenbachi in mid-stride | |
| Scientific classification | |
| Kingdom: | Animalia |
| Phylum: | Chordata |
| Class: | Reptilia |
| Clade: | †Proterochampsia |
| Family: | †Doswelliidae |
| Genus: | †Doswellia Weems, 1980 |
| Type species | |
| Doswellia kaltenbachi Weems, 1980
| |
Doswellia is an extinct genus of archosauriform reptile from the Late Triassic of North America. It is the namesake of the family Doswelliidae, related to the proterochampsids which were more common in South America. Doswellia was a low and heavily built carnivore which lived during the Late Triassic. It possesses many unusual features, including a wide, flattened head with narrow jaws and a box-like rib cage covered by at least ten rows of bony plates.
The type species, Doswellia kaltenbachi, was named in 1980 from fossils found within the Vinita member of the Doswell Formation (formerly known as the Falling Creek Formation) in Virginia. The formation, which is found in the Taylorsville Basin, is part of the larger Newark Supergroup. Doswellia is named after Doswell, the town from which much of the taxon's remains have been found.
A supposed second species, D. sixmilensis, was described in 2012 from the Bluewater Creek Formation of the Chinle Group in New Mexico; however, this species was subsequently recognized as a separate doswelliid genus, Rugarhynchos. Bonafide Doswellia kaltenbachi fossils are also known from the Chinle Formation in Arizona.