Contectopalatus was a primitive ichthyosaur, an extinct fish-like marine reptile from the Middle Triassic of Germany and China.[1] It was originally named Ichthyosaurus atavus by Quenstedt in 1852,[2]Шаблон:Rp and later reassigned to Mixosaurus. It was recognised as a separate genus by Maisch and Matzke in 1998, though other researchers have classified it as a species of Phalarodon instead.[1][3][4]
In 2000, Maisch and Matzke noted that Contectopalatus was a large mixosaurid, calculating a skull length of Шаблон:Convert. Based on jaw fragments, they estimated another specimen they assigned to the species to have been even larger, with a skull length of Шаблон:Convert and a total length of roughly Шаблон:Convert.[5][6] McGowan and Motani (2003), however, considered these estimates to be based on material to fragmentary for confident estimation and taxonomic assignment, instead considering the species to be a small mixosaurid, like the roughly Шаблон:Convert long Mixosaurus cornalianus.[2]Шаблон:Rp
