Cacops

Cacops Temporal range: Early Permian, 274–271 Ma PreЄ Є O S D C P T J K Pg N ↓
Skeleton of Cacops aspidephorus in the Field Museum
Scientific classification
Kingdom:	Animalia
Phylum:	Chordata
Class:	Amphibia
Order:	†Temnospondyli
Family:	†Dissorophidae
Subfamily:	†Cacopinae
Genus:	†Cacops Williston, 1910
Species
†C. aspidephorus Williston, 1910 (type) †C. morrisi Reisz et al., 2009 †C. woehri Fröbisch and Reisz, 2012

Cacops is a genus of dissorophid temnospondyl that is known from the Early Permian of the central United States.

Cacops aspidephorus.

A restoration of the skeleton of Cacops by Samuel Wendell Williston, who named the genus in 1910.

It was about 40 centimetres (16 in) long and well adapted to a terrestrial lifestyle, with a heavily built skull, strong legs, a short tail, and a row of armor plates along its back. Compared to other dissorophids, it has an enormous otic notch in the back of the skull enclosed with a bony bar, indicating a large eardrum. Edwin Colbert suggests that perhaps it was a nocturnal animal like modern frogs. Cacops was first named by American paleontoligist Samuel Wendell Williston with the description of the type species C. aspidephorus from Texas in 1910. A second species, C. morrisi, was named from Oklahoma in 2009.

References

• Colbert, E. H., (1969), Evolution of the Vertebrates, John Wiley & Sons Inc (2nd ed.)