AN ancient 'marine crocodile' thought to be about 185 million years old has been discovered on west Dorset’s Jurassic Coast.

Experts believe it to be one of the oldest specimens of its type ever found following an unearthing of fossils in Charmouth.

With the scientific name ‘Turnersuchus hingleyae’, the reptile is thought to be an ancient ‘sister’ of modern-day crocodiles’ ancestors, a family called ‘thalattosuchian’.

The find at the Charmouth Mudstone Formation found body parts including the head, backbone, and limbs.

The name originates from those who discovered and donated the specimen to the Lyme Regis Museum: Paul Turner and Lizzie Hingley who discovered the fossil in 2017 and where the specimen is currently on display.

The ending “suchus,” is the Latinized form of “soukhos,” - Greek for crocodile.

This specimen is believed to be the only complete enough thalattosuchian of its age – dating back to the Early Jurassic period around 185 million years ago.

Paleontologists state the discovery of this new predator helps fill a gap in the fossil record and suggests that thalattosuchians should have originated around the end of the Triassic period – around 15 million years further back in time than when Turnersuchus lived.

“We should now expect to find more thalattosuchians of the same age as Turnersuchus as well as older,” said Dr. Eric Wilberg, assistant professor at Stony Brook University, based in New York, which has published the find in its Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology.

“I expect we will continue to find more older thalattosuchians and their relatives. Our analyses suggest that thalattosuchians likely first appeared in the Triassic and survived the end-Triassic mass extinction.”

No digs have found thalattosuchians in Triassic rocks yet, which means there is a ghost lineage (a period during which a group must have existed, but experts haven’t yet recovered fossil evidence).

Thalattosuchians are referred to colloquially as ‘marine crocodiles’ or ‘sea crocodiles’. Some became very well adapted to life in the oceans, with short limbs modified into flippers, a shark-like tail fin, salt glands, and potentially the ability to give live birth, rather than lay eggs.

It lived in the Jurassic Ocean preying on marine wildlife and, due to its relatively long, slender snout, would have looked similar in appearance to the currently living gharial crocodiles, which are found in all the major river systems of the northern Indian subcontinent.

Dr. Pedro Godoy, from the University of São Paulo in Brazil and co-author of Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology, added: “Unlike crocodiles, this approximately two-meter-long predator lived purely in coastal marine habitats.

“And though their skulls look superficially similar to modern gharials, they were constructed quite differently”.

The excavation also involved colleagues from the Charmouth Heritage Coast Centre, who helped to unite the parts.

The Jurassic Coast cliffs and the beach have become synonymous for such finds with the discovery of ichthyosaurs and plesiosaurs, as well as the best preserved and most complete dinosaur found so far in Britain, including the Scelidosaurus.