Cistecephalidae is an extinct

family Family (from la, familia) is a group of people related either by consanguinity (by recognized birth) or affinity (by marriage or other relationship). The purpose of the family is to maintain the well-being of its members and of society. Idea ...

dicynodont Dicynodontia is an extinct clade of anomodonts, an extinct type of non-mammalian therapsid. Dicynodonts were herbivorous animals with a pair of tusks, hence their name, which means 'two dog tooth'. Members of the group possessed a horny, typica ...

therapsid Therapsida is a major group of eupelycosaurian synapsids that includes mammals, their ancestors and relatives. Many of the traits today seen as unique to mammals had their origin within early therapsids, including limbs that were oriented mor ...

s from the

Late Permian Late may refer to: * LATE, an acronym which could stand for: ** Limbic-predominant age-related TDP-43 encephalopathy, a proposed form of dementia ** Local-authority trading enterprise, a New Zealand business law ** Local average treatment effect, ...

South Africa South Africa, officially the Republic of South Africa (RSA), is the southernmost country in Africa. It is bounded to the south by of coastline that stretch along the South Atlantic and Indian Oceans; to the north by the neighbouring count ...

India India, officially the Republic of India ( Hindi: ), is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by area, the second-most populous country, and the most populous democracy in the world. Bounded by the Indian Ocean on the ...

and

Zambia Zambia (), officially the Republic of Zambia, is a landlocked country at the crossroads of Central, Southern and East Africa, although it is typically referred to as being in Southern Africa at its most central point. Its neighbours are ...

. It includes the genera '' Cistecephalus'', '' Cistecephaloides'', and ''

Kawingasaurus ''Kawingasaurus'' is an extinct genus of dicynodont therapsid from the Late Permian Usili Formation of Tanzania. It is a member of the family Cistecephalidae Cistecephalidae is an extinct family (biology), family of dicynodont therapsids from ...

''. Cistecephalids are thought to have had a

fossorial A fossorial () animal is one adapted to digging which lives primarily, but not solely, underground. Some examples are badgers, naked mole-rats, clams, meerkats, and mole salamanders, as well as many beetles, wasps, and bees. Prehistoric e ...

or burrowing lifestyle, with adaptations such as broad skulls, strong forelimbs, and squat bodies. A similar group of dicynodonts called the

pylaecephalid Pylaecephalidae is a family of dicynodont therapsids that includes '' Diictodon'', '' Robertia'', and '' Prosictodon'' from the Permian of South Africa. Pylaecephalids were small burrowing dicynodonts with long tusks. The family was first named ...

s were also fossorial, although to a lesser extent than cistecephalids. Cistecephalids showed a high level of endemism, with each of the five known species unique to a single region.

Description

Cistecephalids were small dicynodonts. Most species, with the exception of ''

Kembawacela ''Kembawacela'' ("iron digger") is an extinct genus of cistecephalid dicynodont from the Late Permian of East Africa. The genus contains two known species, the type species ''Kembawacela kitchingi'' from the Madumabisa Mudstone Formation of Za ...

'', lacked tusks, but sexually dimorphic supraorbital ridges were present. Cistecephalids had boxy, broad skulls with relatively laterally directed temporal openings, a result of a considerably broadened intertemporal region. ''Sauroscaptor'', the most basal genus of the family, had a less extreme broadening of the intratemporal region than in other members of the family. In the derived genera ''Cistecephaloides'' and ''Kawingasaurus'', the intratemporal portion of the skull was broader than the skull was long. Cistecephalids also had a relatively posteriorly positioned pineal foramen, which in ''Kembawacela'' and ''Sauroscaptor'' was displaced all the way to the posterior margin of the skull. They also had anteriorly directed orbits; they may have had binocular vision, which may have been an adaptation for nocturnality or an insectivorous lifestyle.

Classification

The Cistecephalidae contains five named genera each with one species. It is a member of the Dicynodont clade

Emydopoidea Emydopoidea is a group of Late Permian dicynodont therapsids. It includes the small-bodied '' Emydops'', '' Myosaurus'', and kingoriids, and the burrowing cistecephalid Cistecephalidae is an extinct family of dicynodont therapsids from the ...

. Phylogeny following Kammerer et al. 2016:

References

Dicynodonts Lopingian first appearances Lopingian extinctions Prehistoric therapsid families {{anomodont-stub