A new Frenguelliidae (Insecta: Odonata) from the Eocene of Arroyo Chacay, Patagonia, Argentina

Abstract

The family Frenguelliidae Petrulevičius & Nel, 2003 was hitherto known from two genera and three species: Frenguellia patagonica Petrulevičius & Nel, 2003, F. iglesiasi Petrulevičius & Nel, 2013 and Treintamilun vuelvenlucha Petrulevičius, 2017. Frenguelliidae is a very interesting group, controversially considered either an Epiproctophora, basal to Euepiproctophora by Petrulevičius & Nel (2003, 2007, 2013) and Petrulevičius et al. (2011), or a Zygoptera by Nel & Arillo (2006), Nel et al. (2008), Lak et al. (2009) and Bechly & Poinar (2013). Only the epiproctophoran hypothesis was discussed and based principally in a putative character of the group, the curved CuP (Petrulevičius & Nel, 2003, 2007, 2013). The zygopteran hypothesis could be reasonably adopted due to the presence in Frenguelliidae of a character which is absent in the basal Epiproctophora: the IR2 aligned with the subnodus (Petrulevičius, 2017).