AGE:
Late Permian, Zone II, 250 million years ago

SIZE:
About the size of a large goanna or large iguana

MEANING OF NAME:
'Reptile from Mezen'

PRONUNCIATION:
Meh-sin-oh-SAWR-us

CLASSIFICATION:
DIAPSIDA: Eosuchia Mesenosauridae

This small, insectivorous reptile was an eosuchian, the group that gave rise to the archosaurs and lizards, the core members of the sauropsid assemblage, which was to replace the theropsid assemblage in the Triassic.

Mesenosaurus was found in red clays deposited in an ancient lake in what is now northern Russia.