It is difficult to determine the affinities of a rept- 
ile known only by remains so fragmentary as those 
now described. It is evident, however, that the bones 
are those of a land-reptile; and the characters of the vertebra 
suggest that they belong either to an Anomodont or to 
a primitive Dinosaur. The fact that the dorsal vertebral 
centrum shows no clear mark of an articular facette 
for the rib, seems to prevent its reference to an Ano- 
modont; while the shape and characters of the cervical 
vertebra are so closely similar to those of a correspon- 
ding vertebra from the Karoo Formation of South Africa 
ascribed to the Dinosaurian Zuskelesaurus by Seeley (*), 
that the new Brazilian reptile is probably allied to the 
latter. The striking inequality in the size of the obli- 
quely curved toes is also less suggestive of ‘an Ano- 
modont than of a Dinosaur; and although it is possible 
that some of the larger Anomodonts had a digital for- 
mula like that of lizards and crocodiles, this was not 
the normal condition, and a digit with four phalanges 
is more likely to have belonged to a Dinosaur than to 
a member of the more primitive Order. 
I therefore refer the new Brazilian fossils to a 
shortnecked Dinosaur allied to Huskelesaurus, and I 
propose to name this reptile Scaphonyx in allusion to 
the unique inferior excavation of the ungual phalanges. 
The species may be known as Scaphonyx fischer. 
If this determination be correct, the rocks in which 
the bones were found may be regarded as of Triassic 
age. Scaphonyx is also to be considered as the first 
fossil land-reptile discovered in South America which 
clearly belongs to the fauna of «Gondwana Land». 
(*) H. G. Seeley, «On Euskelesaurus brownii (Huxley)», Ann. Mag. 
Nat. Hist. (6) Vol, XIV (1894), p, 339, fig. 7. Original vertebra now in the 
British Museum. 
