The holotype and only known specimen consists of a largely complete skull that was unfortunately overprepared, removing many of the surficial details; the specimen is reposited at the
Texas Memorial Museum. Wilson provided a short description of features that he could observe, remarking on its distinction from the much larger, aquatic temnospondyls found in the Late Triassic and referred the taxon to a new family, the
Latiscopidae. He placed this family within the
Stereospondyli based on a few aspects of the palate and the absence of rhachitomous temnospondyls in the
Dockum Group. He considered it somewhat similar to the
Trematosauridae based on the relatively long and narrow skull but remarked that
Latiscopus was probably not aquatic based on the laterally facing orbits. Subsequent authors proposed various affinities, including to
rhytidosteids, with
Almasaurus habbazi, another small temnospondyl from the Late Triassic of disputed phylogenetic affinities, and to
trematosaurs. Because of its poor condition,
Latiscopus has never been analyzed in a phylogenetic analysis, but
Almasaurus, which is sometimes placed within the Latiscopidae, is typically recovered as a trematosaur.
Latiscopus was re-examined as part of the description of the morphologically similar
Rileymillerus from the Late Triassic of Texas. Bolt & Chatterjee amended many of the statements made by Wilson, frequently noting that claims about the anatomy could not be verified or were erroneous. They concluded that the specimen was too poorly preserved in its current state to be properly comparable to other temnospondyls and designated it as a
nomen dubium. == References ==