Open Paleo

Musango

Barrett et al., 2026

Named for the Musango Concession Area and nearby Musango Island at the type locality on Lake Kariba; 'musango' is a chiShona word meaning 'living in the bush', alluding to the remoteness of the site.

227.3–205.7 million years ago Norian, Late Triassic
Late Triassic stages

Musango is an extinct genus of unaysaurid sauropodomorph dinosaurs from the Upper Triassic (Norian) Pebbly Arkose Formation of Zimbabwe. The genus contains a single species, Musango matusadonaensis, known from a partial skeleton. Musango represents the fifth dinosaur genus to be named from Zimbabwe.

Under dispute

The unaysaurid affinity of Musango rests on a single analysis with weak support throughout. Barrett and colleagues (2026) recover Musango as the sister taxon of the sympatric Musankwa within Unaysauridae in all most-parsimonious trees, but that pairing is supported by one highly homoplastic astragalar character at a Bremer support of 1, and the authors caution that the relationship is unlikely to prove robust as new material comes to light. The position of Unaysauridae itself alternates between a sister-group relationship with Plateosauridae and the earliest-diverging position within Massopoda.

Diagnosis

  1. Middle caudal vertebrae bear exceptionally elongate transverse processes, more than twice the centrum's transverse width and exceeding centrum anteroposterior length
  2. Distal ends of the middle caudal transverse processes are anteroposteriorly expanded and fan-shaped
  3. The supraacetabular crest of the ilium bifurcates posteriorly into two ridges
  4. The lateral margin of the pubic apron is greatly thickened and expanded anteroposteriorly relative to the medial margin, forming a prominent buttress
  5. The medial surface of the fibula's proximal expansion bears a deep concavity with a prominent ventrally extending midline ridge
  6. Two subparallel ridges extend from the posteromedial corner of the astragalus's ascending process

Species

Musango matusadonaensis Barrett et al., 2026

Type species

Named for Matusadona National Park, adjacent to the type locality in Zimbabwe.

Holotype
NHMZ 2583 , Natural History Museum of Zimbabwe
Material
Dorsal, sacral and caudal vertebrae, rib fragments, gastralia, chevrons, left scapula and coracoid, humerus, manual ungual, ilium, pubis, tibia, fibula, astragalus, calcaneum, metatarsal V and a pedal phalanx
Horizon
Pebbly Arkose Formation, Norian, Late Triassic , 227.3–205.7 million years ago
Locality
Musango Archosaur Site, Mashonaland West, Zimbabwe

References

  1. Barrett, P. M.; Botha, J.; Sciscio, L.; Stuart, B. P.; Lovegrove, J.; Munyikwa, D.; Zondo, M.; Broderick, T. J.; Edwards, S. F.; Mbambo, E.; Chapelle, K. E. J.; Dollman, K. N.; Tolan, S.; Choiniere, J. N. (2026). A new sauropodomorph dinosaur from the Pebbly Arkose Formation (Upper Triassic: Norian) of Kariba, Zimbabwe. Journal of Systematic Palaeontology 24(2): 2678610. Informa UK Limited. doi:10.1080/14772019.2026.2678610 barrett2026a