The oldest Jurassic anurans from continental Africa (Tendaguru Hill, Tanzania)

Anurans are a diverse clade of tetrapods with a rich evolutionary history beginning ~250 Ma. Most time-calibrated molecular phylogenetic analyses place the early diversification of anurans during the Jurassic, with the emergence of several major modern anuran clades linked to the break-up of the Pangea. However, remains of crown-anurans before the Cretaceous are scarce, especially in Gondwana. Here, we described the first lissamphibian specimens from Jurassic outcrops in continental sub-Saharan Africa, with five specimens from the Jurassic Middle Dinosaur Member of the Tendaguru Formation (Tendaguru Hill, Tanzania). The specimens represent at least two distinct lissamphibian taxa, based on humeral morphologies. Comparisons with humeri from other lissamphibian clades reveal that the morphology of the Tendaguru specimens fits within Salientia (stem-Anura). Further, two humeri can be securely assigned to Anura, making these the oldest occurrence of the crown-group in Africa as well as within Gondwana.