A new latest Cretaceous pleurodiran turtle (Testudinata: <i>Dortokidae</i>) from the Haţeg Basin (Romania) documents end-Cretaceous faunal provinciality and selective survival during the K-Pg extinction

<i>Dortokidae</i> is an endemic family of stem-pleurodiran turtles, known exclusively from the Cretaceous and early Paleogene of Europe. Here we describe a new dortokid taxon from the Upper Cretaceous (Maastrichtian) Sînpetru Formation of the southern Haţeg Basin, Romania. The type material of <i>Dortoka vremiri</i> sp. nov. comprises a well-preserved carapace and a nearly complete plastron as well as the <i>in situ</i> right scapula and right pubis. Phylogenetic analyses performed to assess the position and interrelationships of <i>Dortoka vremiri</i> sp. nov. within <i>Dortokidae</i> as well as within the wider <i>Pleurodira</i> recovered the new taxon firmly nested within <i>Dortokidae</i>, and together with other dortokids, placed along the stem lineage of pleurodires. Our analysis provides evidence for allopatric speciation in <i>Dortoka</i> through the presence of two distinct lineages – an eastern and a western European lineage, respectively. A similar east/west disjunct distribution pattern has also been established previously for several vertebrate groups such as other turtles, dinosaurs and mammals, probably resulting from isolation due to the particular palaeogeographical setting of the Late Cretaceous European Archipelago. The phylogeny demonstrates local survival of <i>Dortoka</i> across the K-Pg boundary as the sister-taxon of <i>D. vremiri</i> is <i>D</i>. <i>botanica</i> from the uppermost Paleocene deposits of Romania and points to geographical selectivity, as the western lineage of <i>Dortoka</i> went extinct before the Paleogene. Osteology and novel taphonomical data imply a semi-terrestrial lifestyle for <i>Kallokibotion bajazidi</i>, a turtle occurring in coeval faunas with the aquatic and smaller-sized <i>D</i>. <i>vremiri</i> and most likely going extinct at the K-Pg boundary. Altogether, this pattern is consistent with selective extinction of terrestrial taxa previously observed for other continental vertebrate assemblages across the end-Cretaceous mass extinction with only two other examples from turtles. http://zoobank.org/urn:lsid:zoobank.org:pub:871AD436-9448-40C6-85A4-0213CBC04A29