Pronunciation: SHEEN-go-PAH-nah
Meaning: Wide neck
Author/s: Gorscak et al. (2017)
Synonyms: None known
First Discovery: Songwe, Tanzania
Acta Ordinal: #970
Shingopana songwensis
Shingopana songwensis was a modest-sized titanosaur, far from the scale of the group's true behemoths, that roamed what is now southwestern Tanzania during the Late Cretaceous, around 74 million years ago. Its name—drawn from the Swahili for "wide neck"—reflects a key anatomical quirk: neck vertebrae crowned with distinctive, bulbous flares—features so unlike those of any other titanosaur on its own continent that its closest relatives were found thousands of miles away, in what is now South America.
That far-flung kinship reaches back to Gondwana, the southern supercontinent that once stitched Africa, South America, India, Australia, Antarctica, and Madagascar into a single landmass. Gondwana began pulling apart in the Early Jurassic, around 180 million years ago, and Africa and South America continued drifting until the Atlantic widened between them. By the time Shingopana lived, the continents were well on their separate ways, but the shared ancestry had been baked into the lineage many millions of years earlier.
That far-flung kinship reaches back to Gondwana, the southern supercontinent that once stitched Africa, South America, India, Australia, Antarctica, and Madagascar into a single landmass. Gondwana began pulling apart in the Early Jurassic, around 180 million years ago, and Africa and South America continued drifting until the Atlantic widened between them. By the time Shingopana lived, the continents were well on their separate ways, but the shared ancestry had been baked into the lineage many millions of years earlier.
(Wide neck from Songwe)Etymology
Shingopana is derived from the Swahili "shingo" (neck) and "pana" (wide or broad), referring to the bulbous spine on the top of each neck vertebra.
The species epithet, songwensis, means "from Songwe" in Latin.
ZooBank registry: urn:lsid:zoobank.org:act:B0EF28D6-322F-4A64-8639-10358C4F6284.
Discovery
The first remains of Shingopana were discovered at "locality TZ-07" in the Namba Member of the Galula Formation (Red Sandstone Group, Rukwa Rift Basin), west of the city of Mbeya in the Songwe region of the Great Rift Valley, southwestern Tanzania, during the Rukwa Rift Basin Project (an international effort by palaeontologists from Ohio University, Michigan State University, James Cook University, and the University of Dar es Salaam) in 2002.
Additional elements of the skeleton were discovered over the course of three field seasons (2002–2004).
The holotype (RRBP 02100) is a partial skeleton including five
neck vertebrae, six partial neck ribs, four partial back ribs, a nearly complete left upper arm, a partial pelvic bone, and a scattering of incomplete and/or unidentifiable fragments—many of which bear creepy-crawly bore marks that fall into five distinct categories, ranging from small vertical tubes and larger irregular openings to surface-running furrows, broad meandering channels, and the occasional pupation chamber.
Preparator
J. P. Cavigelli.
