Article · Wikipedia archive · Last revised Jul 23, 2026

Santanmantis

Santanmantis is an extinct genus of mantises, the sole genus in the family Santanmantidae. The only species, Santanmantis axelrodi, is known from the Crato Formation of Brazil, dating to the late Aptian stage of the Early Cretaceous. It is amongst the most primitive known lineages of mantis. Like other mantises, the forelegs are modified into spined raptorial appendages. When describing a new specimen in 2017, Hörnig, Haug and Haug proposed that the second set of legs also had spines similar to the forelegs, and also served a raptorial function, but that they were not visible in the fossil due to being broken off. However a response to this paper criticised this assumption, finding that it had little evidence from the fossil itself or from living mantises.

Last revised
Jul 23, 2026
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≈ 1 min
Length
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Citations
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Wikipedia ↗
Santanmantis
Temporal range:
Specimen MB.I.2068
Life restoration (Note: the spines on the second set of legs have been considered questionable by other authors)
Scientific classification Edit this classification
Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Arthropoda
Clade: Pancrustacea
Class: Insecta
Order: Mantodea
Family: †Santanmantidae
Grimaldi 2003
Genus: †Santanmantis
Grimaldi, 2003
Species:
†S. axelrodi
Binomial name
†Santanmantis axelrodi
Grimaldi, 2003

Santanmantis is an extinct genus of mantises, the sole genus in the family Santanmantidae. The only species, Santanmantis axelrodi , is known from the Crato Formation of Brazil, dating to the late Aptian stage of the Early Cretaceous.123 It is amongst the most primitive known lineages of mantis.4 Like other mantises, the forelegs are modified into spined raptorial appendages. When describing a new specimen in 2017, Hörnig, Haug and Haug proposed that the second set of legs also had spines similar to the forelegs, and also served a raptorial function, but that they were not visible in the fossil due to being broken off.5 However a response to this paper criticised this assumption, finding that it had little evidence from the fossil itself or from living mantises.6

References

References

  1. "Santanmantis". GBIF. Retrieved 2019-05-11.
  2. Otte, Daniel; Spearman, Lauren; Stiewe, Martin B. D. (2019). "genus Santanmantis Grimaldi, 2003". Mantodea species file online, Version 5.0. Retrieved 2019-05-11.
  3. Demers‐Potvin, Alexandre V.; Larsson, Hans C.E.; Cournoyer, Mario; Béthoux, Olivier (January 2021). "Wing morphology of a new Cretaceous prayin g mantis solves the phylogenetic jigsaw of early‐diverging extant lineages". Systematic Entomology. 46 (1): 205–223. doi:10.1111/syen.12457. ISSN 0307-6970. S2CID 231391397.
  4. Hörnig, Marie K.; Haug, Joachim T.; Haug, Carolin (2017-07-24). "An exceptionally preserved 110 million years old praying mantis provides new insights into the predatory behaviour of early mantodeans". PeerJ. 5 e3605. doi:10.7717/peerj.3605. ISSN 2167-8359. PMC 5527957. PMID 28761789.
  5. Brannoch, Sydney K.; Svenson, Gavin J. (2017-11-16). "Response to "An exceptionally preserved 110 million years old praying mantis provides new insights into the predatory behaviour of early mantodeans"". PeerJ. 5 e4046. doi:10.7717/peerj.4046. ISSN 2167-8359. PMC 5694651. PMID 29158979.