Pouitella Explained

Pouitella is an extinct genus of terrestrial ophidian known from the Cenomanian of Brézé and Lussant, France^[1] and was first described by J-C. Rage in 1988.^[2] Only the type species, P. pervetus is known and the holotype (Univ. Paris-VI, no. BRZ 1) consists only of middle trunk vertebrae.

Pouitella was probably the sister taxon of the slightly older Lapparentophis from the ?Albian-Cenomanian of Algeria, Morocco and Sudan.^[3] Pouitella was initially believed to have been a snake, but later studies have found it to fall under Ophidia, the clade which Serpentes also belongs to.

Notes and References

1. G. Cuny, J.-J. Jaeger, M. Mahboubi, J.-C. Rage. (1990). Les plus anciens serpents (Reptilia, Squamata) connus. Mise au point sur l’âge géologique des serpents de la partie moyenne du Crétacé C. R. Acad. Sci. Paris, Sér. II, 311, pp. 1267-1272
2. Rage, J-C. (1988). A primitive snake in the Cenomanian. [in French] C. R. Acad. Sci. Paris, Sér. II. 307, 1027-1032
3. Romain Vullo . 2019 . A new species of Lapparentophis from the mid-Cretaceous Kem Kem beds, Morocco, with remarks on the distribution of lapparentophiid snakes . Comptes Rendus Palevol . 18 . 7 . 765–770 . 10.1016/j.crpv.2019.08.004 . free .