Where were the first mososaur fossils discovered?
Mosasaur
Mosasaurs (from Latin Mosa meaning the 'Meuse river', and Greek σαύρος sauros meaning 'lizard') are an extinct group of large marine reptiles containing 38 genera in total. Their first fossil remains were discovered in a limestone quarry at Maastricht on the Meuse in 1764. Mosasaurs probably evolved from an extinct group of aquatic lizards[1] known as aigialosaurs in the Early Cretaceous. During the last 20 million years of the Cretaceous period (Turonian-Maastrichtian ages), with the extinction of the ichthyosaurs and pliosaurs, mosasaurs became the dominant marine predators. They became extinct as a result of the K-Pg event at the end of the Cretaceous period, about 66 million years ago.
Mosasaurinae
The lineage first appears in the Turonian and thrived until the mass extinction event at the end of the Maastrichtian. They ranged in size from some of the smallest known mosasaurs ("Carinodens", 3–3.5 meters), to medium-sized taxa ("Clidastes", 6+ meters), to the largest of the mosasaurs ("Mosasaurus hoffmannii") potentially reaching about 15 m in length. Many genera of mosasaurines were either piscivorous or generalists, preying on fish and other marine reptiles, but one lineage, the Globidensini, evolved specialized crushing teeth, adapting to a diet of ammonites and/or marine turtles.