Eunotosaurus

Eunotosaurus (Latin: stout-backed lizard) is an extinct genus of reptile, possibly a close relative of turtles. Eunotosaurus lived in the late Middle Permian (Capitanian stage) and fossils can be found in the Karoo Supergroup of South Africa and the Mwesia Beds of Malawi. Eunotosaurus resided in the swamps of what is now southern Africa. Its ribs were wide and flat, forming broad plates similar to a primitive turtle shell, and the vertebrae were nearly identical to those of some turtles. Accordingly, it is often considered as a possible transitional fossil between turtles and their prehistoric ancestors. However, it is possible that these turtle-like features evolved independently of the same features in turtles, since other anatomical studies and phylogenetic analyses suggest that Eunotosaurus may instead have been a parareptile, an early-diverging neodiapsid unrelated to turtles, or a synapsid.