Additional snakes from the uppermost cretaceous (Maastrichtian) of India

Abstract

The Maastrichtian fauna from India includes snakes that are still poorly known, but potentially of great interest. Two new Indian localities of Maastrichtian age have yielded snake fossils and another Maastrichtian locality from which snake fossils were previously reported has yielded additional specimens. Apart from the previously reported Indophis (?Nigerophiidae), snakes from these localities include taxa that are new for India (an indeterminate madtsoiid and the aniliid s.l. Coniophis) and some enigmatic forms, the latter represented by a compound bone and a vertebra. The madtsoiid and, perhaps, Indophis are of Gondwanan affinities, whereas the palaeogeographical origins of the other taxa are unknown. The indeterminate forms appear to be very peculiar. Thus far, snakes from the Mesozoic of India are known only from the Maastrichtian.