| Albionbaataridae | ||||||||||||
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Albionbaatar Proalbionbaatar | ||||||||||||
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Albionbaataridae is a family of small, fossil mammals within the order Multituberculata. Remains are known from the Upper Jurassic and Lower Cretaceous of Europe. These herbivores lived their obscure lives during the 'age of the dinosaurs'.
For the technically minded, they were amongst the more derived representatives of the informal suborder of "Plagiaulacida".
Taxon: Albionbaataridae Kielan-Jaworowska Z & Ensom PC, 1994
Remarks: Small euro-teeth, which once inhabited small euro-mouths, though long before Europa was seduced by Zeus.
Expressed rather more knowledgeably: "Shrew-sized taxa that differ from all other multituberculates in having relatively flat, multi-cusped anterior upper premolars, with 10-14 cusps arranged in three rows, rather then 3-4, rarely up to nine high cusps in two rows, and in having lingual slope of all premolars covered by prominent, subparallel ridges...," (Kielan-Jaworowska & Hurum, 2001, p.414).
Reference: Kielan-Jaworowska & Ensom (1994), Tiny plagiaulacoid multituberculate mammals from the Purbeck Limestone Formation of Dorset, England. Paleontology, 37, p. 17-31.
Page reference: Kielan-Jaworowska Z & Hurum JH (2001), Phylogeny and Systematics of multituberculate mammals. Paleontology 44, p.389-429.
(This information has been derived from [1] MESOZOIC MAMMALS; Plagiaulacidae, Albionbaataridae, Eobaataridae & Arginbaataridae, an internet directory. As that's my webpage, there are no issues of copyright. Trevor Dykes)