Bretesuchus

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title: "Bretesuchus" type: doc version: 1 created: 2026-02-28 author: "Wikipedia contributors" status: active scope: public tags: ["sebecidae", "paleocene-crocodylomorphs", "paleocene-reptiles-of-south-america", "riochican", "itaboraian", "thanetian-life", "paleogene-argentina", "fossils-of-argentina", "salta-basin", "fossil-taxa-described-in-1993", "prehistoric-pseudosuchian-genera"] description: "Extinct genus of reptiles" topic_path: "geography/argentina" source: "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bretesuchus" license: "CC BY-SA 4.0" wikipedia_page_id: 0 wikipedia_revision_id: 0

::summary Extinct genus of reptiles ::

| taxon = Bretesuchus | fossil_range = Late Paleocene (Itaboraian-Riochican) ~ | image = Bretesuchus bonapartei.jpg | image2 = Bretesuchus skull diagram.png | image2_caption = Skull diagram showcasing preserved elements in white | authority = Gasparini, Fernandez & Powell, 1993 | type_species = Bretesuchus bonapartei | type_species_authority = Gasparini et al., 1993

Bretesuchus is an extinct genus of sebecosuchian mesoeucrocodylian within the family Sebecidae known from northwestern Argentina. It was a large apex predator (total length approximately 4 m).

Discovery

::figure[src="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/d2/Bretesuchus_size_reference.png" caption="Hypotherical body silhouette based in relatives, compared to a 175cm tall human"] ::

Fossils of Bretesuchus have been found in the El Brete locality, from the Maíz Gordo Formation of northwestern Argentina and date back to the Thanetian stage of the late Palaeocene, about 58.7-55.8 million years ago. Bretesuchus was originally assigned to its own family, the Bretesuchidae which was found to be the sister group of Sebecus. However, recent phylogenetic analyses found Bretesuchidae to nest deeply within Sebecidae, and thus to be synonymous with it. Zulmasuchus was found to be closely related to Sebecus, as originally had been proposed. ::figure[src="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/a3/Bretesuchus_portrait_paleoart.png" caption="Life reconstruction"] ::

Etymology

::figure[src="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/00/Bretesuchus.jpg" caption="''Bretesuchus'' capturing an hypothetical notoungulate."] ::

Bretesuchus was named by Zulma Gasparini, Marta Fernandez and Jaime E. Powell in 1993 and the type species is Bretesuchus bonapartei. The generic name refers to the "El Brete" locality, where the fossil remains were found, and suchus, Latinized from the Greek souchos, an Egyptian crocodile god. The specific name honors Jose Bonaparte.

References

References

1. [https://paleobiodb.org/classic/checkTaxonInfo?taxon_no=157980 ''Bretesuchus''] at [[Fossilworks]].org
2. (1993). "New Tertiary sebecosuchians (Crocodylomorpha) from South America: phylogenetic implications". Historical Biology.
3. http://darrennaish.files.wordpress.com/2013/01/naish-2001-geology-today-crocodilians.pdf page 73.
4. (2005). "A new sebecosuchian crocodyliform from the Late Cretaceous of Patagonia". [[Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology]].
5. Diego Pol and Jaime E. Powell. (2011). "A new sebecid mesoeucrocodylian from the Rio Loro Formation (Palaeocene) of north-western Argentina". Zoological Journal of the Linnean Society.

::callout[type=info title="Wikipedia Source"] This article was imported from Wikipedia and is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Content has been adapted to SurfDoc format. Original contributors can be found on the article history page. ::