Cladodontomorphi, Ginter, Hampe, and Duffin, 2010

Ginter, Michał & Złotnik, Michał, 2019, Mississippian chondrichthyan fishes from the area of Krzeszowice, southern Poland, Acta Palaeontologica Polonica 64 (3), pp. 549-564 : 556

Cladodontomorphi indet. 1

Fig. 5A, B .

Material.— Two teeth (ZPAL P. IV/255, 306) from the upper Viséan, Czerna, sample Cz-1.

Description.—There are two teeth of this type, similar to each other, in the sample from Czerna. One is larger, more than 1 mm wide, and the other smaller, about 0.5 mm mesio-distally. They are very delicate and brittle, virtually symmetrical. Their crown is multicuspid, comb-like, of the cladodont design. The median cusp is very slender, covered with only a few cristae, rather strong in comparison to the width of the cusp (the smooth surface of the labial side in the smaller tooth ( Fig. 5B 2 ), is probably due to the post-mortem destruction of enameloid). There are seven lateral cusplets on each side of the median cusp in the larger tooth, of which the fourth are the highest. In the smaller tooth, there are only five cusplets on each side. The smaller cusplets often grow on a side of the larger one.

The base is triangular in the oral view and its orolingual side is somewhat wavy, with a shallow sulcus in the middle. The basolabial rim is slightly elevated, forming a kind of a parapet, at least in the larger specimen. There are numerous irregularly placed foramina in the aboral/labial region, but their presence may be an effect of abrasion.

Remarks.— Because of their size, numerous slender cusplets and the base devoid of any articulation devices, these teeth could be equivocated with Denaea wangi . However, their almost complete symmetry, the ornamentation of the larger cusps and the specific type of growth of the intermediate cusplets (on a side of the larger ones) are the features which combined preclude their belonging not only to Denaea , but also to Falcatidae and even Symmoriiformes . The closest teeth known to us are those of Tamiobatis vetustus sensu Williams (1998) from the upper Famennian of Ohio, USA,

.e., a ctenacanthiform. However, the teeth of Tamiobatis have an additional row of labial accessory cusplets, absent from the teeth from Czerna, and the median cusp in Tamiobatis is usually shorter and wider. Therefore, we temporarily leave them as Cladodontomorphi indet. 1, without determining an order.

Figures

Fig. 5. Chondrichthyan fish teeth from the upper Viséan of Czerna, Poland. A, B. Cladodontomorphi indet. 1. A. ZPAL P. IV/255 in labial (A1) and basal (A2) views. B. ZPAL P. IV/306, small specimen with a broken piece lying nearby in lingual (B1) and oral (B2) views. C. Ctenacanthidae indet., ZPAL P. IV/307 in oral (C1) and labial (C2) views. D. Cladodontomorphi indet. 2, ZPAL P. IV/308 in labial (D1), lingual (D2), and oral (D3) views. E. Cassisodus sp., ZPAL P. IV/309 in oral (D1) and lingual (D2) views. F. Cassisodus sp., ZPAL P. IV/232 in lingual (E1) and oral (E2) views.

Fig. 2. Teeth of chondrichthyan fish Thrinacodus ferox (Turner, 1982) from the upper Viséan of Czerna, Poland (A, B) and the Tournaisian of Czatkowice, Poland (C–F). A. ZPAL P. IV/301, in labial (A1) and oral (A2) views. B. ZPAL P. IV/302 in oral view. C. MWGUW/Ps/13/1 in lingual (C1), labial (C2), oral (C3), and lateral (C4) views. D. MWGUW/Ps/1/212, subsymmetrical, parasymphysial (?) tooth in lingual (D1), labial (D2), and lateral (D3) views. E. MWGUW/Ps/1/214 in lateral view. F. MWGUW/Ps/1/213 in basal view.