Maastrichtidelphys
Maastrichtidelphys is a Late Cretaceous genus of metatherian (marsupial lineage) mammal from the Netherlands in Europe. The genus contains a single species, M. meurismeti. It is known from an extremely small right upper molar, and analysis of it suggests that "Maastrichtidelphys" is most closely related to the North American herpetotheriid marsupial, "Nortedelphys", which is Lancian in age.

"Maastrichtidelphys" belongs to a group of mammals with their origins in North America, the Herpetotheriidae. The presence of "Maastrichtidelphys" in Europe in the Late Cretaceous shows there was a high-latitude North Atlantic dispersal route between North America and Europe for marsupials, which suggests they spread across Europe at least 10 million years earlier than previously thought.
Q44626
Cretaceous
TIME
Q1096960
metatherian
Concept
Q55
Netherlands
LOC
None
Nortedelphys
UNK
Q6483765
Lancian
LOC
Q5743809
Herpetotheriidae
Concept
Q5390461
Maastrichtidelphys
Concept
Q5390461
Maastrichtidelphys
Concept
Q5390461
Maastrichtidelphys
Concept
Q5390461
Maastrichtidelphys
Concept
+10^^http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#decimal
10
NUMBER
parent taxon