THE

OCCURRENCE OF MOSASAURS IN EGYPT

AND IN AFRICA IN GENERAL1"

(with two plates) BY

While the majority of the Mosasaurs known up to now have been described from certain parts of the U. S. A. and Belgium where they are ra¬ ther common, these peculiar reptiles have only occasionally been reported from other parts of the world, and in most of these latter cases the ma¬ terial available has been quite insufficient for any closer determination. There is no doubt however that during the Upper Cretaceous the Mosasaurs had a world-wide distribution and that they can be expected wherever shallow-water deposits of this age are found. From the African continent they have so far been reported from Egypt (Barron and Hume, 1900 and 1902; Quaas, 1902; Priem, 191/1; di Stefano, 1919; Gemellaro, 1921; Blanckenhorn , 1921; Stromer, 1980), from Morocco (Depéret and Russo, 192/1 and 1925), Nigeria (Swinton, 1980), and Pondoland (Broom, 1912). In this connection the description of Liodon asialicum from the neighbourhood of Jerusalem by Repelin (1915) might also be mentioned.

The earliest discovery in Egypt of Mosasaurian remains seems to be the one by Figari Bey in sinking a boring in Wadi Qena (32° 4o' E), and referred to by Barron and Hume (1902, pp. 172 and 181) and by Blanckenhorn (1921, p. 55). The bones were found at a depth of 4 00