Marasuchus lilloensis (Romer, 1972)

Rauhut, Oliver W. M., 2003, The interrelationships and evolution of basal theropod dinosaurs, Special papers in palaeontology 69, pp. 1-213 : 12

Marasuchus lilloensis (Romer, 1972)

Age . Ladinian.

Occurrence. Los Chanares Formation, La Rioja, Argentina.

Diagnosis. Posterior cervical neural spines project anterodorsally; neural spines of mid- to posterior dorsal vertebrae contact each other dorsally.

Remarks. Marasuchus lilloensis is a small carnivorous dinosauriform from the Middle Triassic of South America. The taxon was originally described as a new species of Lagosuchus by Romer (1972) and later even synonymized with the type species of the genus, Lagosuchus talampayensis ( Bonaparte 1975) . However, Sereno and Arcucci (1994) argued that the holotype of Lagosuchus talampayensis is undiagnostic and consequently referred Lagosuchus lilloensis to a new genus, Marasuchus .

Marasuchus is closely related to dinosaurs (Sereno and Arcucci 1994; Novas 1996 «) and is therefore used as an outgroup here.

Triassic OTUs