Article révisé par les pairs
| Résumé : | Eoplethodus chaneti gen. and sp. nov. from the marine Albian (Cretaceous) of Provence (France) and the evolution of the caudal skeleton within the Tselfatiiformes (Osteichthyes, Teleostei). The caudal skeleton of Eoplethodus chaneti gen. and sp. nov., a fossil teleost from the marine Albian (Cretaceous) of France is described. This fish belongs to the cohort Clupeocephala and the order Tselfatiiformes (= Bananogmiiformes). The caudal skeleton of E. chaneti still offers a well developed preural 1 vertebra, three epurals, a pair of stegurals, and normal preural 1 hemal arch and parhypural. It is thus more primitive than the one of the Plethodidae, the family grouping all the other genera of this order, where the preural 1 vertebra is reduced, the epurals and parhypural lost, the preural 1 hemal arch atrophied or lost, and the pair of stegurals changed into a false preural 1 neural spine. E. chaneti allows a better understanding of the evolution of the caudal skeleton within the Tselfatiiformes. |
