Gorgonophontes is an extinct genus of mantis shrimp that lived during the late Carboniferous period in what is now the United States and Belgium.

In 1922, Victor van Straelen described nine fossil specimens made up mostly of pyritized material on black shale, which were collected from lower Westphalian-aged deposits near Liège, Belgium.

He reported that 100 specimens of Gorgonophontes had been found in the upper Pennsylvanian-aged black shales of Nebraska and Iowa, occurring in the Oread, Dennis and Swope formations.

The holotype specimen, SDSNH 4393, was collected from the Stark Shale member of the Dennis Formation near Papillion, Nebraska.

[5] Later, Schram publishes a paper in 2007 reexamining Paleozoic stomatopods in which he independently reached the same conclusion that Gorgonophontes is the proper genus for this species.

The protopod (basal segment) of the uropod is rectangular and has two movable spines on its posterior margin, one of which is slightly curved and two to three times longer than the other.

[4] However, in 2007 Schram revised the relations between early stomatopods and established the family Gorgonophontidae, to which Gorgonophontes was reassigned.

Archaeocaris vermiformis Archaeocaris graffhami †Bairdops elegans Perimecturus parki Perimecturus rapax †Bairdops beargulchensis †Daidal pattoni †Daidal schoellmanni †Daidal acanthocercus Gorgonophontes fraiponti Gorgonophontes peleron †Chabardella spinosa †Tyrannophontes theridion †Tyrannophontes gigantion †Triassosculda ahyongi †Tyrannosculda laurae †Pseudosculda laevis †Archaeosculda phoenicia †Sculda pennata †Sculda syriaca †Ursquilla yehoachi †Lysiosquilla nkporoensis †Nodosculda fisherorum Squilla mantis

This is supported by the fact that its walking appendages were too short to facilitate a wide stance, and that the animal was unable to lift the front of its body, making it incapable of catching prey while standing on the bottom.

Similar conditions are seen in Tyrannophontes and Tyrannosculda, suggesting early mantis shrimps were not benthic animals like their modern counterparts.