Parvipelvia (

Latin Latin (, or , ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally a dialect spoken in the lower Tiber area (then known as Latium) around present-day Rome, but through the power ...

for "little pelvis" - ''parvus'' meaning "little" and ''pelvis'' meaning "pelvis") is an extinct clade of euichthyosaur

ichthyosaur Ichthyosaurs (Ancient Greek for "fish lizard" – and ) are large extinct marine reptiles. Ichthyosaurs belong to the order known as Ichthyosauria or Ichthyopterygia ('fish flippers' – a designation introduced by Sir Richard Owen in 1842, altho ...

s that existed from the

Late Triassic The Late Triassic is the third and final epoch (geology), epoch of the Triassic geologic time scale, Period in the geologic time scale, spanning the time between annum, Ma and Ma (million years ago). It is preceded by the Middle Triassic Epoch ...

to the early

Late Cretaceous The Late Cretaceous (100.5–66 Ma) is the younger of two epochs into which the Cretaceous Period is divided in the geologic time scale. Rock strata from this epoch form the Upper Cretaceous Series. The Cretaceous is named after ''creta'', ...

(middle

Norian The Norian is a division of the Triassic Period. It has the rank of an age ( geochronology) or stage (chronostratigraphy). It lasted from ~227 to million years ago. It was preceded by the Carnian and succeeded by the Rhaetian. Stratigraphic ...

to Cenomanian) of

Asia Asia (, ) is one of the world's most notable geographical regions, which is either considered a continent in its own right or a subcontinent of Eurasia, which shares the continental landmass of Afro-Eurasia with Africa. Asia covers an ...

, Australia,

Europe Europe is a large peninsula conventionally considered a continent in its own right because of its great physical size and the weight of its history and traditions. Europe is also considered a subcontinent of Eurasia and it is located enti ...

, North America and

South America South America is a continent entirely in the Western Hemisphere and mostly in the Southern Hemisphere, with a relatively small portion in the Northern Hemisphere at the northern tip of the continent. It can also be described as the souther ...

. Named by Ryosuke Motani, in 1999, it contains the basal taxa like ''

Macgowania ''Macgowania'' is an extinct genus of parvipelvian ichthyosaur known from British Columbia of Canada. History of research ''Macgowania'' is known only from the holotype ROM 41992 ( RBCM EH 91.2.5), a partial skeleton which preser ...

'' and '' Hudsonelpidia''. Maisch and Matzke (2000) found in their analysis seven synapomorphies that support Parvipelvia. They also found 10 synapomorphies that support the existence of post-Triassic clade of ichthyosaurs (all parvipelvians excluding ''Macgowania'' and ''Hudsonelpidia''), for which the name Neoichthyosauria was found to be available. Parvipelvians were the only ichthyosaurs to survive the Triassic-Jurassic extinction event.

Phylogeny

Parvipelvia is a

node-based taxon Phylogenetic nomenclature is a method of nomenclature for taxa in biology that uses phylogenetic definitions for taxon names as explained below. This contrasts with the traditional approach, in which taxon names are defined by a ''type'', which c ...

defined in 1999 as "the last common ancestor of ''Hudsonelpidia'', ''Macgowania'', ''

Ichthyosaurus ''Ichthyosaurus'' (derived from Greek ' () meaning 'fish' and ' () meaning 'lizard') is a genus of ichthyosaurs from the Early Jurassic (Hettangian - Pliensbachian), with possible Late Triassic record, from Europe (Belgium, England, Germany, Sw ...

'' and all of its descendants". Maisch and Matzke (2000) also defined Neoichthyosauria which is a node-based taxon originally named by P. Martin Sander in 2000, as "the last common ancestor of '' Temnodontosaurus trigonodon'' and ''

Ophthalmosaurus icenicus ''Ophthalmosaurus'' (meaning "eye lizard" in Greek) is an ichthyosaur of the Jurassic period (165–150 million years ago). Possible remains from the Cretaceous, around 145 million years ago, are also known. It was a relatively medium-sized ichth ...

'' and all of its descendants". The

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

s below follows Motani (1999) and Maisch and Matzke (2000).

References

Ichthyosaurs Late Triassic ichthyosaurs Early Jurassic ichthyosaurs Middle Jurassic ichthyosaurs Late Jurassic ichthyosaurs Early Cretaceous ichthyosaurs Late Cretaceous ichthyosaurs Norian first appearances Turonian extinctions Cretaceous reptiles of Asia Cretaceous reptiles of Australia Cretaceous reptiles of Europe Early Cretaceous reptiles of North America Late Cretaceous reptiles of North America Cretaceous reptiles of South America Jurassic reptiles of Asia Jurassic reptiles of Europe Early Jurassic reptiles of North America Middle Jurassic reptiles of North America Late Jurassic reptiles of North America Jurassic reptiles of South America Late Triassic reptiles of Asia Late Triassic reptiles of Europe Late Triassic ichthyosaurs of North America Late Triassic reptiles of South America Ichthyosaurs of Europe {{ichthyosaur-stub