Pythonoidea

Pythonoidea
Scientific classification
Kingdom:	Animalia
Phylum:	Chordata
Class:	Reptilia
Order:	Squamata
Suborder:	Serpentes
Infraorder:	Alethinophidia
Superfamily:	Pythonoidea
Families
Pythonidae Loxocemidae Xenopeltidae

The Pythonoidea, also known as pythonoid snakes, are a superfamily of snakes that contains pythons (family Pythonidae) and other closely related python-like snakes (but not boas, which are in a separate superfamily called Booidea). As of 2018, Pythonoidea contains 43 species, including the eponymous genus Python and 7 other genera of pythons (Antaresia, Aspidites, Bothrochilus, Liasis, Malayopython, Morelia, and Simalia), all in the family Pythonidae, as well as two lesser-known families, Loxocemidae (1 species of Mexican burrowing "python" in the genus Loxocemus) and Xenopeltidae (2 species of sunbeam snakes in the genus Xenopeltis).^[1]

The taxonomy of pythons, boas, and other henophidian snakes has long been debated, and ultimately the decision whether to assign a particular clade to a particular Linnaean rank (such as a superfamily, family, or subfamily) is arbitrary. The clade name Pythonoidea emphasizes the relatively close evolutionary relationship among these 43 species, which last shared a common ancestor about 62 [CI: 46-78] million years ago, in contrast to the more distant relationship between pythonoids and their next closest relatives, uropeltoids (the most recent common ancestor between pythonoids and uropeltoids lived ~73 [CI:59-87] million years ago).^[2]

References