Odonatoptera

Odonatoptera Temporal range: Late Carboniferous - Recent PreЄ Є O S D C P T J K Pg N
The giant griffinfly Meganeura monyi lived some 300 million years ago. It was as large as a crow.
Scientific classification
Kingdom:	Animalia
Phylum:	Arthropoda
Class:	Insecta
Division:	Palaeoptera
Superorder:	Odonatoptera Martynov, 1932
Orders
See text
Synonyms
Campylopterodea Rohdendorf, 1962 Odonatoidea Lameere, 1936

See text

Campylopterodea Rohdendorf, 1962
Odonatoidea Lameere, 1936

The Odonatoptera are a superorder (sometimes treated as an order) of ancient winged insects, placed in the Palaeoptera which probably form a paraphyletic group however. The dragonflies and damselflies are the only living members of this group, which was far more diverse in the late Paleozoic and contained gigantic species, including the griffinflies (colloquially called "giant dragonflies", although they were not dragonflies in the strict sense) of the order Protodonata. This lineage dates back at least to the Bashkirian, not quite 320 million years ago. 

There is little consensus about the relationships of the Odonatoptera. What is certain is that they are a clade of winged insects that stands outside the Neoptera. But various authors' analyses have yielded any one of three mutually exclusive phylogenies, or some variant thereof: The least problematic (in a taxonomic sense) view is that the Odonatoptera are the sister taxon of the Ephemeropteroidea (the mayfly lineage), and that the Palaeodictyopteroidea are either their sister taxon or a basal assemblage, all within a monophyletic Palaeoptera. But few recent analyses have supported this. Rather, it seems more and more likely that the Odonatoptera are the sister taxon of the Neoptera, making the "Palaeoptera" paraphyletic. The third view places the mayfly lineage as sister taxon of the neopterans, with the Odonatoptera as most primitive winged insects; it has seen little support in recent decades however.