New marsupial relatives in the LRT found for Xenocranium with its ‘puffy’ squamosals
Corrections today
to earlier errors made on the strange skull of Xenoranium = ‘strange skull’ (Figs 1, 2), a burrowing marsupial from North America NOT related to burrowing marsupials from Australia.
Traditionally Xenocranium has been considered a placental.
Those ‘fat cheeks’ can be compared with similar, but smaller structures on larger, more familiar taxa, listed below.
Similar laterally expanded squamosal bases
form the posterior zygomatic arch on terrestrial relatives and ancestors: Vincelestes, Sarcophagus (the extant Tasmanian Devil) and most closely to Ernanodon (Fig 2). Most of the other skull traits are more or less good matches, at least for scoring in the large reptile tree (LRT, 2340 taxa).
According toWikipedia,
Ernanodon (“a sprout of toothless animals”) is an extinct genus of placental mammal from extinct family Ernanodontidae within extinct order Palaeanodonta, that lived from the middle to late Paleocene in China (Nongshan Formation)[2] and Mongolia.
This is not a novel phylogenetic solution
to the problem of where to nest Xenocranium. Wikipedia also nested it with Ernanodon (Fig 2).
Beyond that, however, this appears to be the first time these two taxa have been associated with the marsupials with canines, Sarcophilus and Vincelestes, other than earlier here.
Earlier academic studies considered Ernanodon and Xenocranium to be insectivorous burrowing placentals. According to Wikipedia – Palaeonodonta “While the taxonomic grouping of Palaeanodonta has been debated, it is widely thought that they are a sister group to pangolins.”
Why ‘puffy’ zygomatic arches?
As fossorial burrowers, eyesight becomes almost useless, but hearing became ever more acute (presumably). A µCT scan of the squamosal of Xenocranium should and could find out if this chamber was somehow modified to amplify auditory sensations – or whatever else might be discovered there. Evidence is needed here.
Just a suggestion for a Masters thesis.
References
wiki/Xenocranium
wiki/Epoicotheriidae
wiki/Palaeanodonta
Source: https://pterosaurheresies.wordpress.com/2026/11/14/new-marsupial-relatives-in-the-lrt-found-for-xenocranium-with-its-puffy-squamosals/
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