''Enseosteus'' is an

extinct Extinction is the termination of an organism by the death of its Endling, last member. A taxon may become Functional extinction, functionally extinct before the death of its last member if it loses the capacity to Reproduction, reproduce and ...

genus Genus (; : genera ) is a taxonomic rank above species and below family (taxonomy), family as used in the biological classification of extant taxon, living and fossil organisms as well as Virus classification#ICTV classification, viruses. In bino ...

of small selenosteid

arthrodire Arthrodira (Greek for "jointed neck") is an Order (biology), order of extinct armored, jawed fishes of the class Placodermi that flourished in the Devonian period before their sudden extinction, surviving for about 50 million years and penetratin ...

placoderm Placoderms (from Ancient Greek πλάξ 'plax'', ''plakos'''Plate (animal anatomy), plate' and δέρμα 'derma'''skin') are vertebrate animals of the class (biology), class Placodermi, an extinct group of prehistoric fish known from Pal ...

s known from the Upper

Frasnian The Frasnian is one of two faunal stages in the Late Devonian Period. It lasted from million years ago to million years ago. It was preceded by the Givetian Stage and followed by the Famennian Stage. Major reef-building was under way during ...

Kellwasserkalk facies of Late

Devonian The Devonian ( ) is a period (geology), geologic period and system (stratigraphy), system of the Paleozoic era (geology), era during the Phanerozoic eon (geology), eon, spanning 60.3 million years from the end of the preceding Silurian per ...

Germany Germany, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It lies between the Baltic Sea and the North Sea to the north and the Alps to the south. Its sixteen States of Germany, constituent states have a total popu ...

and

Morocco Morocco, officially the Kingdom of Morocco, is a country in the Maghreb region of North Africa. It has coastlines on the Mediterranean Sea to the north and the Atlantic Ocean to the west, and has land borders with Algeria to Algeria–Morocc ...

. ''Enseosteus'' is very similar to the other Kellwasserkalk selenosteids, though, the type species, ''E. jaekelli'', has a bulbous, knob-shaped rostrum. Denison (1978) synonymizes the genera ''Ottonosteus'' (''O. jaekeli'' = ''E. hermanni'') and '' Walterosteus'' with ''Enseosteus'', claiming that the two genera are too similar to ''Enseosteus'' to merit separate genus status. Rücklin (2011) agrees with Denison's synonymizing of ''Ottonosteus'', but rejects Denison's synonymization of ''Walterosteus'', claiming how ''Walterosteus'' has a contact between the rostral plate and the pineal plate, which ''Enseosteus'' does not.

References

Selenosteidae Placoderms of Europe Placoderms of Africa {{Placoderm-stub