Cantioscyllium cf. decipiens Woodward, 1889

Vullo, Romain, Cappetta, Henri & Néraudeau, Didier, 2007, New sharks and rays from the Cenomanian and Turonian of Charentes, France, Acta Palaeontologica Polonica 52 (1), pp. 99-116 : 104

Cantioscyllium cf. decipiens Woodward, 1889

Fig. 2B .

Material.—A single isolated tooth (UM AMA 1) from l’Amas, Roullet–Saint−Estèphe, Upper Cenomanian D.

Description.—This is a complete lateral tooth, broader than high. The triangular main cusp bears on its labial face a few enameloid folds. They are not very strong, and are restricted to the basal half of the crown. The apron is very broad, not prominent, and slightly bifid. There are two pairs of small, blunted, lateral cusplets (damaged on the mesial side). In occlusal view, the medio−lingual protuberance is not very well developed. The hemiaulacorhize root displays one pair of large margino−lingual foramina.

Remarks.—Teeth of Cantioscyllium are relatively common in the Lower Cenomanian of Charentes, and even can be very abundant locally, like in the sands of the “Font−de−Benon” quarry at Archingeay−Les Nouillers ( Vullo et al. 2003). Despite this, the tooth described herein represents the first occurrence of this genus in the Upper Cenomanian of the Charentes region. Although the labial face of the crown is less densely folded than in C. decipiens , this tooth is morphologically close to the specimens figured by Cappetta (1973) and Cappetta and Case (1999), and can be tentatively assigned to the type species. Furthermore, a comparison can also be made with very similar teeth, described by Bernardez (2002) as “ Cantioscyllium sp. B ”, from the Upper Cenomanian of northern Spain. Conversely, the specimen UM AMA 1 differs from the two other Upper Cretaceous species, C. meyeri Case and Cappetta, 1997 and C. nessovi Ward and Averianov, 1999 , which have narrower and more folded lateral teeth. It also differs from the Lower Cretaceous species C. alhaulfi Kriwet, 1999 , which has teeth with a single pair of cusplets and very few labial folds. Finally, our tooth fits well with the type specimen from the Turonian of England described by Woodward (1889) and illustrated in 1911 (pl. 42: 7–11).

Figures

Fig. 2. Teeth of the hemiscylliid Almascyllium Cappetta, 1980a, the ginglymostomatid Cantioscyllium Woodward, 1889, the cretoxyrhinid Archaeolamna Siverson, 1992 and the anacoracid Squalicorax Whitley, 1939 from the Cenomanian and Turonian of Charentes, SW France. A. Almascyllium sp., Font−de−Benon, Lower Cenomanian; labial view of UM FBN 1. B. Cantioscyllium cf. decipiens Woodward, 1889, l’Amas, Upper Cenomanian; labial (B1), and occlusal (B2) views of UM AMA 1. C. Archaeolamna sp., l’Amas, Upper Cenomanian; labial (C1), and lingual (C2) views of UM AMA 2. D. Squalicorax baharijensis Stromer, 1927, Le Mas, Upper Cenomanian; labial (D1), and lingual (D2) views of UM LMS 1. E. Holotype of Squalicorax coquandi sp. nov., Port−des−Barques, basal Turonian; labial (E1), distal (E2), and lingual (E3) views of UM PDB 1. F. Squalicorax cf. intermedius Glückman in Glückman and Shvazhaite, 1971, Le Puits des Insurgés, Upper Cenomanian; labial (F1), mesial (F2), and lingual (F3) views of UM PDI 1.