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Batrachotomus was a loricatan archosaur from the Middle Triassic of Germany. That makes it a crocodile-line archosaur (it was on the branch that includes living alligators and crocodiles). This 4 m (13 foot) predator walked in a non-sprawling stance, with enlarged limb muscles for rapid, upright locomotion on dry land. Evidence from bone histology suggests enhanced growth rates, suggesting that it (like many other croc-line archosaurs) had an elevated metabolism higher than the crocodilians of today.
In some ways it would have looked like living crocodilians, with scales and armor running down its back. Yet the sharp teeth in its big head were likely covered in lips, unlike the lipless condition the ancestors of modern crocodilians evolved after becoming semi-aquatic.
