''Tatrasuchus'' is an extinct

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 ...

temnospondyl Temnospondyli (from Greek language, Greek τέμνειν, ''temnein'' 'to cut' and σπόνδυλος, ''spondylos'' 'vertebra') or temnospondyls is a diverse ancient order (biology), order of small to giant tetrapods—often considered Labyrinth ...

from the

Middle Triassic In the geologic timescale, the Middle Triassic is the second of three epoch (geology), epochs of the Triassic period (geology), period or the middle of three series (stratigraphy), series in which the Triassic system (stratigraphy), system is di ...

of Poland and Germany. It is classified as a member of the family Cyclotosauridae or

Mastodonsauridae Mastodonsauridae is a family of capitosauroid temnospondyls. Fossils belonging to this family have been found in North America, Greenland, Europe, Asia, and Australia. The family Capitosauridae is synonymous with Mastodonsauridae. Description S ...

. It is closely related to the genus ''

Cyclotosaurus ''Cyclotosaurus'' is an extinct genus of temnospondyl within the family (biology), family Mastodonsauridae. It was of great size for an amphibian, had an elongated skull up to . Etymology The name means "round eared lizard" in Ancient Greek, de ...

''. The

type species In International_Code_of_Zoological_Nomenclature, zoological nomenclature, a type species (''species typica'') is the species name with which the name of a genus or subgenus is considered to be permanently taxonomically associated, i.e., the spe ...

, ''Tatrasuchus kulczyckii'', was named in 1996. Damiani (2001) considered genus ''

Kupferzellia ''Tatrasuchus'' is an extinct genus of temnospondyl from the Middle Triassic of Poland and Germany. It is classified as a member of the family Cyclotosauridae or Mastodonsauridae. It is closely related to the genus ''Cyclotosaurus''. The type spe ...

'' Schoch (1997) from the Middle Triassic of

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 ...

to be a junior synonym of ''Tatrasuchus'', and recombined its type species, ''K. wildi'' as the second species of ''Tatrasuchus''. This classification was followed by some authors, e.g. Fortuny ''et al.'' (2011); other authors, e.g. Schoch (2008), maintain ''Tatrasuchus'' and ''Kupferzellia'' as distinct genera. However, Schoch & Moreno (2024) synonymized the two genera, maintaining ''T. wildi'' as a distinct species from ''T. kulczyckii''.

Phylogeny

Below is a

cladogram A cladogram (from Greek language, Greek ''clados'' "branch" and ''gramma'' "character") is a diagram used in cladistics to show relations among organisms. A cladogram is not, however, an Phylogenetic tree, evolutionary tree because it does not s ...

from Fortuny ''et al.'' (2011):

References

Capitosauria Triassic temnospondyls of Europe {{temnospondyli-stub