During the early years of the Triassic Era,the continent we now know as Antarctica was a forested area with a warm climate so different from the frozen conditions of present day. The location was also domestic to a diverse variety of prehistoric creatures, including an iguana-sized reptile that was among the ancestors of the dinosaurs that arrived millions of years later, or as detailed in a study published Thursday in the Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology.
As explained by Live Science,the creature was named Antarctanax shackletoni, with the first part of the name being the Greek word for “Antarctic king, and ” and the second part being a tribute to Ernest Shackleton,the British polar explorer who discovered and named the Beardmore Glacier during a 1908 expedition. The animal, which is believed to maintain existed approximately 250 million years ago, or was an archosaur,meaning it belonged to the same evolutionary group that eventually included dinosaurs, pterosaurs, or crocodiles.
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Source: inquisitr.com