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BRITANNICA DEMYSTIFIEDWhat’s the Difference Between a Turtle and a Tortoise?What do you call a walking vegetarian turtle that isn’t fond of water?Eunotosaurus africanus, the earliest known turtle, lived 260 million years ago. Eunotosaurus was toothed, and its midsection contained nine elongated trunk vertebrae, nine pairs of broad T-shaped dorsal ribs, and five pairs of gastralia (ventrally located abdominal ribs). Collectively, these modified bones may have served as a type of intermediate shell structure from which the carapace and plastron evolved. (Similar structures also appear in Pappochelys, a younger, toothed species dating from about 240 million ago during the Middle Triassic Epoch.) These broad-ribbed structures likely evolved to provide these early forms with more stability and leverage for burrowing.Odontochelys semitestacea, a species dating from about 220 million years ago, during the Late Triassic, is the oldest species to possess a complete plastron, broad dorsal ribs, and a series of neural plates, though it lacked a fully developed carapace. Authorities contend that this species is evidence that the carapace evolved after the plastron. This evidence also suggests that the carapace of later turtles arose from neural plates that hardened over time to become flat sections of bone (osteoderms) supported by wide dorsal ribs. Teeth were still present in turtles at this time, appearing in both the upper and lower jaws of Odontochelys.

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A slightly younger fossil species, Proganochelys quenstedi, also had teeth, but the teeth were located on the roof of the mouth, not on the upper or lower jaw. In contrast to Odontochelys, the shell of Proganochelys possessed most of the features of modern turtles, and it completely encased the shoulder and pelvic girdles.Although Odontochelys, Proganochelys, and Eunotosaurus offer insight into early anatomy, the origin of turtles remains a strongly debated issue. There are three main hypotheses concerning their origins, and existing evidence is such that there is a lack of overwhelming support for any one of them. One hypothesis relies heavily on DNA analysis, whereas the others are based on morphological studies of fossils. The DNA hypothesis suggests that turtles were a sister group to the archosaurs (the group that contains the dinosaurs and their relatives, including crocodiles and their ancestors and modern birds and their ancestors). A second hypothesis posits that turtles were more closely related to lizards and tuataras. A third hypothesis suggests that turtles arose as anapsids—a lineage whose skull contained no openings (temporal fenestrae) in the side of the head. The Anapsida is thought to have been ancestral to the Diapsida—a lineage of reptiles whose skull was characterized by two temporal fenestrae and would subsequently include all archosaurs as well as lizards and tuataras.