Njalila

Njalila was originally described in 1950 by the German palaeontologist Friedrich von Huene on the basis of two skulls collected from the Usili Formation (formerly known as K6 or the Kawinga Formation), located in the Ruhuhu Basin of southern Tanzania. The two specimens in question are now catalogued as GPIT/RE/7118 (the holotype specimen) and GPIT/RE/7119 in the palaeontological collection of the University of Tübingen. Furthermore, Sigogneau (1970) only considered the holotype of D. quadrata from Malawi to belong to Aelurognathus, and she did not consider two additional specimens referred to D. quadrata by von Huene in 1950 from Tanzania (GPIT/RE/7120 and GPIT/RE/7121 Nonetheless, Sigogneau was cautious in the referral of "D." nasuta to Arctognathus, The genus name Njalila was first proposed for "D." nasuta in 2007 by the German palaeontologist Eva Gebauer in her unpublished PhD thesis, in which it was named after the Njalila River, a tributary of the Ruhuhu River in Tanzania. In an article published in early 2026, Gebauer and her German colleague Michael W. Maisch formally redescribed the fossils of this taxon. In doing so, they officially established and diagnosed the genus Njalila as the valid and available name for "D." nasuta, in the new combination N. nasuta. Also in her 2007 thesis, Gebauer proposed the existence of a second species of the genus Njalila, "N. insigna", based on another Tanzanian skull that had previously been referred to the South African gorgonopsian Scylacops capensis (MZC 885). She distinguished "N. insigna" from N. nasuta by the presence of thicker arches between its skull openings, a posteriorly wider skull, and a slightly more rounded snout profile. The specific epithet of this proposed taxon is a Latin term meaning "remarkable" or "conspicuous", in reference to the differences noted between it and N. nasuta. However, in their 2026 publication, Gebauer and Maisch did not follow this interpretation, instead cautiously referring the specimen to N. cf. nasuta. ==Description==

Njalila is only known by its skull and jaws, which measured roughly in length (mid-sized for a gorgonopsian) and had a relatively short and compact snout. Compared with similarly short-snouted gorgonopsians (such as Arctognathus and Eriphostoma) the skull is not as wide at the rear, with only weakly flaring zygomatic arches and little constriction of the snout behind the canines. As such, its skull appears much more straight-sided when viewed from above, and is also generally wider than it is tall. Similarly, the profile of the skull along the top of the snout is also largely straight, although the tip is characteristically turned up in a sharp point above the nostrils, which were positioned far-forwards on the snout. The snout is also distinctive for its unusual 'pinched' appearance. The nasal bones along the top of the snout are broad, but are constricted along the middle. Furthermore, the septomaxilla (a small bone found in and around the nostrils of therapsids) bulges strongly outwards under and behind the nostrils but then rapidly hollows out just behind them on either side, giving the bridge of the nose the pinched appearance. ==Classification==

The phylogenetic relationships of Njalila were first analysed by Gebauer in her unpublished 2007 PhD thesis in the first computerised phylogenetic analysis of gorgonopsians ever conducted. Gebauer found Njalila as a member of the family Gorgonopsidae, which in her classification excluded the most basal genera of gorgonopsians in her tree that she regarded as plesiomorphic (i.e. representing the ancestral condition) for the group. Within Gorgonopsidae, Njalila was a relatively derived member but outside of the clade including the giant Rubidgeinae and Inostrancevia, occupying part of an evolutionary grade between them and more ancestral gorgonopsids. The results of Gebauer (2007) are depicted in the cladogram below. Since a 2018 study authored by Kammerer and his Russian colleague Vladimir Masyutin, gorgonopsians have been divided into two subgroups of African and Russian origin, with the exception of the basal genera Nochnitsa and Viatkogorgon. In their 2026 publication, Gebauer and Maisch recovered Njalila within the African clade, where it is identified as a potential sister taxon to Arctognathus, although this result is only weakly supported in their analysis. ==Paleoecology==

of a gorgonopsian hunting a herd of dicynodonts, based after the Usili Formation All known fossil specimens of Njalila have come from the Usili Formation, Ruhuhu Basin, southern Tanzania. Njalila was contemporary with many other gorgonopsians. These include Cyonosaurus, Gorgonops, Inostrancevia, Lycaenops, "Sauroctonus" parringtoni, Scylacops and the rubidgeines Aelurognathus, Dinogorgon, Rubidgea, Ruhuhucerberus and Sycosaurus Daptocephalus, Dicynodon, Dicynodontoides, Endothiodon, Euptychognathus, Geikia, Katumbia, Kawingasaurus, Oudenodon, Pristerodon, Rhachiocephalus and an indeterminate cryptodont. An undetermined biarmosuchian similar to Burnetia is also known. Therapsids are not the only tetrapods present in the Usili Formation. Indeed, sauropsids such as the archosauromorph Aenigmastropheus and the pareiasaurs Anthodon and Pareiasaurus are known. The only temnospondyl recorded is Peltobatrachus. ==Notes==