Henophidia is a former superfamily of the suborder Serpentes (

snake Snakes are elongated, limbless, carnivorous reptiles of the suborder Serpentes . Like all other squamates, snakes are ectothermic, amniote vertebrates covered in overlapping scales. Many species of snakes have skulls with several more j ...

s) that contains boas,

pythons The Pythonidae, commonly known as pythons, are a family of nonvenomous snakes found in Africa, Asia, and Australia. Among its members are some of the largest snakes in the world. Ten genera and 42 species are currently recognized. Distribution ...

and numerous other less-well-known

s. Snakes once considered to belong to superfamily Henophidia include two families now considered

Amerophidia The Amerophidia, also known as amerophidian snakes, are a superfamily of snakes that contains two families: Aniliidae (containing a single species, ''Anilius scytale The Aniliidae are a monotypic family created for the monotypic genus ''Ani ...

(

Aniliidae The Aniliidae are a monotypic family created for the monotypic genus ''Anilius'' that contains the single species ''A. scytale''. Common names include American pipe snake and false coral snake. It is found in South America. This snake posses ...

– red pipe snakes, and

Tropidophiidae The Tropidophiidae, common name dwarf boas or thunder snakes, are a family of nonvenomous snakes found from Mexico and the West Indies south to southeastern Brazil. These are small to medium-sized fossorial snakes, some with beautiful and striking ...

– dwarf "boas" or thunder snakes), three families now considered Uropeltoidea (

Cylindrophiidae The Cylindrophiidae are a monotypic family of secretive, semifossorial, non-venomous snakes containing the genus ''Cylindrophis'' found in southeastern Asia. These are burrowing snakes and most have a banded pattern on the belly. Currently, thirt ...

– Asian pipe snakes, Anomochilidae – dwarf pipe snakes, and

Uropeltidae The Uropeltidae, also known commonly as the shieldtails or the shield-tailed snakes, are a family of primitive, nonvenomous, burrowing snakes native to peninsular India and Sri Lanka. The name is derived from the Greek words ('tail') and ('sh ...

– shield-tailed snakes and short-tailed snakes), three families now considered

Pythonoidea The Pythonoidea, also known as pythonoid snakes, are a superfamily of snakes that contains pythons (family Pythonidae) and other closely related python-like snakes (but not boas, which are in a separate superfamily called Booidea). As of 2022, ...

(

Pythonidae The Pythonidae, commonly known as pythons, are a family of nonvenomous snakes found in Africa, Asia, and Australia. Among its members are some of the largest snakes in the world. Ten genera and 42 species are currently recognized. Distributi ...

– pythons, Loxocemidae – Mexican burrowing snake, and Xenopeltidae – sunbeam snakes), at least one family now considered

Booidea The Booidea, also known as booid snakes, are a superfamily of snakes that contains boas (family Boidae) and other closely related boa-like snakes (but not pythons, which are in a separate superfamily called Pythonoidea). As of 2017, Booidea conta ...

(

Boidae The Boidae, commonly known as boas or boids, are a family of nonvenomous snakes primarily found in the Americas, as well as Africa, Europe, Asia, and some Pacific Islands. Boas include some of the world's largest snakes, with the green anacond ...

– boas ncluding sand boas and many other lineages often called boas, mostly now considered subfamilies of Boidaeref name="Reynolds14"/>), and Bolyeriidae – Round Island splitjaw snakes. Because these snakes do not form a

monophyletic group A clade (), also known as a monophyletic group or natural group, is a group of organisms that are monophyletic – that is, composed of a common ancestor and all its lineal descendants – on a phylogenetic tree. Rather than the English term, ...

they can no longer be formally referred to using a single name. In modern usage, "Henophidia" is often placed in quotes, because it can be convenient to refer to all lineages that used to be considered Henophidia. Another way of thinking about it is that "henophidian" snakes are all snakes that are not

Scolecophidia The Scolecophidia, commonly known as blind snakes or thread snakes, are an infraorder of snakes. They range in length from . All are fossorial (adapted for burrowing). Five families and 39 genera are recognized. The Scolecophidia infraorder is mo ...

(blindsnakes) or

Caenophidia The Caenophidia are a derived clade of alethinophidian snakes, which contains over 80% of all the extant species of snakes. The largest family is Colubridae, but it also includes at least seven other families, at least four of which were once ...

(so-called "advanced snakes"). "Henophidian" snakes are sometimes said to be more "basal" or "primitive" than those belonging to the

, but this does not mean that they are inferior or that they have evolved less, rather that we think they share more traits with their common ancestor in comparison to the Caenophidia.

Etymology

''Henophidia'' comes from the

Greek Greek may refer to: Greece Anything of, from, or related to Greece, a country in Southern Europe: *Greeks, an ethnic group. *Greek language, a branch of the Indo-European language family. **Proto-Greek language, the assumed last common ancestor ...

''heno-'' meaning ''one'' or ''former'' and ''ophidia'' meaning ''serpent'',''-ophidia''
a
wordinfo.info
/ref> so ''former/older snakes'' (in contrast to

, i.e. ''recent snakes'').

Former families

– coral pipe snakes and pipe snakes. * Anomochilidae – dwarf pipe snakes. *

– boas (including sand boas) * Bolyeriidae – Round Island boas. *

– Asian pipe snakes. * Loxocemidae – Mexican burrowing snake. *

– pythons *

– dwarf boas. *

– shield-tailed snakes and short-tail snakes. * Xenopeltidae – sunbeam snakes.

References

Alethinophidia {{snake-stub