Roxochelys harrisi, Pacheco, 1913

Gaffney, Eugene S., Meylan, Peter A., Wood, Roger C., Simons, Elwyn & De Almeida Campos, Diogenes, 2011, Evolution Of The Side-Necked Turtles: The Family Podocnemididae, Bulletin of the American Museum of Natural History 2011 (350), pp. 1-237 : 70-71

‘‘Podocnemis’ ’ harrisi Pacheco, 1913

Roxochelys harrisi ( Pacheco, 1913) Broin, 1991 Roxochelys harrisi ( Pacheco, 1913) Candeiro et al.,

2006

TYPE SPECIMEN: DGM 287, right xiphiplastron and three peripherals, Pacheco (1913: text fig. 6, pl. 3, fig. 6a–6e), ‘‘all of which appear to be lost at present’’ ( Candeiro et al., 2006: 927).

TYPE LOCALITY: Colina, São Paulo State, Brazil.

HORIZON: Adamantina Fm. fide Candeiro et al. (2006).

REFERRED MATERIAL: None.

PREVIOUS WORK AND DISCUSSION: Price (1953) raised the issue of similarity between harrisi and wanderleyi , which was formalized by Broin (1988, 1991) and Kischlat (1994), both of whom referred these species to Roxochelys . The species harrisi itself has never had reasonable material added to the type specimens, which are undiagnosable by any objective criteria. Oliveira and Romano (2007) considered it a nomen dubium.

‘‘Stereogenys’ ’ podocnemoides Reinach, 1903b

Podocnemis podocnemoides (Reinach) Schmidt, 1940

‘‘ Erymnochelyinae indet. Genus indet. ( Neochelys group?: ‘ Stereogenys ’) podocnemoides ’’ Lapparent de Broin, 2000a

TYPE SPECIMEN: An unnumbered plastron ( Reinach, 1903b: pl. 10) in the Bayerische Staatssammlung für Paläontologie und historische Geologie in Munich. Not seen, apparently lost in World War II ( Crumly, 1984).

TYPE LOCALITY: Northwest of Lake Qarun, near ‘‘Dime’’ ( Reinach, 1903b)

HORIZON: ‘‘Obere Mitteleocän,’’ probably Qasr el-Sagha Fm., Late Eocene.

DIAGNOSIS: The only diagnostic character likely to be useful at this point is the anterior lobe of the plastron, which shows a long, narrow intergular scale separating both gular and humeral scales. The carapace, not part of the type but associated with it by Reinach (1903b: pl. 11, fig. 1), does not show the supposedly diagnostic character of the shell attributed to ‘‘ Stereogenys ,’’ the separation of the first neural from the nuchal.

DISCUSSION: This species must be considered to consist only of the type plastron as there is no evidence that it was part of the same individual as the referred carapace. The plastron apparently comes from the Eocene Qasr el-Sagha Fm. and is a possible candidate for the shell specimens in the DPC from the same unit, rather than the Oligocene fajumensis that we have chosen. It is possible that the type specimen of ‘‘ Stereogenys ’’ podocnemoides Reinach is in fact the same species as the DPC material, but difficult to demonstrate with the present material. In the first place, the type specimen, even if it still existed, is inadequate to diagnose a podocnemidid species in our opinion. Secondly, there is variation in the known Oligocene specimens of fajumensis , including an articulated set of epiplastra and entoplastron (AMNH 5093) that has a long intergular scale separating the gulars and reaching (but not separating as in podocnemoides ) to the humeral scales. Thirdly, there are a number of Eocene Neochelys from Europe that have this exact pattern ( Broin, 1977: figs. 12, 22). Nonetheless, there are no known specimens of Oligocene fajumensis or of DPC specimens here identified as fajumensis that actually have the scale pattern shown in the type of podocnemoides . But it is still probably Neochelys .

It would be best to recognize ‘‘ Stereogenys podocnemoides ’’ Reinach, 1903b, as a nomen dubium.

CRANIAL MORPHOLOGY OF LAPPARENTEMYS , PRICEMYS , PEIROPEMYS, AND BAURUEMYS