''Scalopocephalus'' 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 ...

of therocephalian therapsids from the

Late Permian Late or LATE may refer to: Everyday usage * Tardy, or late, not being on time * Late (or the late) may refer to a person who is dead Music * ''Late'' (The 77s album), 2000 * Late (Alvin Batiste album), 1993 * Late!, a pseudonym used by Dave Groh ...

South Africa South Africa, officially the Republic of South Africa (RSA), is the Southern Africa, southernmost country in Africa. Its Provinces of South Africa, nine provinces are bounded to the south by of coastline that stretches along the Atlantic O ...

. German paleontologist Friedrich von Huene discovered the

holotype A holotype (Latin: ''holotypus'') is a single physical example (or illustration) of an organism used when the species (or lower-ranked taxon) was formally described. It is either the single such physical example (or illustration) or one of s ...

skull of ''Scalopocephalus'' from the ''Cistecephalus'' Assemblage Zone in 1924 and named 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 ...

''Scalopocephalus watsonianus'' in 1937. ''Scalopocephalus'' is similar in appearance to ''Scaloposaurus'' and was first classified in the family

Scaloposauridae Baurioidea is a superfamily (zoology), superfamily of therocephalian therapsids. It includes advanced therocephalians such as ''Regisaurus'' and ''Bauria''. The superfamily was named by South African people, South African paleontologist Robert Br ...

. Scaloposauridae is no longer recognized as a valid group, and ''Scalopocephalus'' is now classified as a basal member of Baurioidea.

References

Baurioidea Therocephalia genera Lopingian synapsids of Africa Prehistoric synapsids of Africa Lopingian genus first appearances Lopingian genus extinctions {{paleo-therapsid-stub