Solving a dinosaurian puzzle: The identity of Aliwalia rex Galton

Eucnemesaurus fortis Van Hoepen 1920 from the Late Triassic of South Africa is demonstrated to be the senior synonym of the puzzling dinosaur taxon Aliwalia rex Galton 1985. A new specimen of this poorly-known taxon is described. Eucnemesaurus is clearly a sauropodomorph and increases the diversity of sauropodomorph taxa in the South African Late Triassic to six. It shares a number of femoral synapomorphies with Riojasaurus from the Late Triassic of Argentina and Riojasauridae tax. nov. is erected to accommodate them. These conclusions are supported by a comprehensive cladistic analysis of 46 sauropodomorph and other basal dinosauriform taxa using 353 osteological characters. This analysis also supports the paraphyletic nature of the traditional 'prosauropod' assemblage.