THE FIRST BOTHRIOLEPIS-ASSOCIATED DEVONIAN FISH FAUNA FROM AFRICA

A black carbonaceous shale, exposed in road cuttings that intersected rocks of the Witpoort Formation (Witteberg Group), Eastern Cape Provin ce, South Africa, has yielded the fragmentary remains of about 50 fish es, in addition to numerous plant fossils. The depositional site is in terpreted to have been a stagnant coastal lagoon sheltered by a barrie r island. The fish fauna comprises acanthodian spines, a nearly comple te probable holo-cephalan chondrichthyan, various armour plates of the antiarch placoderm Bothriolepis, portions of head and trunk plates of placoderms of the families Groenlandaspididae and Phyllolepidae, and probably Macroperalichthyidae, the parasphenoid bone of a lungfish, a small crossoptelygian (probably a coelacanth) dissociated palaeoniscoi d scales and large sarcopterygian scales, which may be from the lungfi sh. This is the first record of the cosmopolitan Devonian genus Bothri olepis from Africa with an associated ichthyofauna. The presence of Bo thriolepis with groenlandaspidid and phyllolepid placoderms indicates a Late Devonian age.