The alligator was described by French naturalist Albert-Auguste Fauvel in 1879 as "Alligator sinensis". The genus "Alligator" had previously contained only the American alligator since its creation in 1807. Fauvel wrote a detailed description of the species in a book titled "Alligators in China: Their History, Description & Identification", including information about its historical account. In 1947, it was suggested to group the Chinese alligator in a separate genus from its American relative, due to the Chinese alligator's bony plate on its upper eyelid. This bony plate is present in caimans, but is rarely present in the American alligator. At the time, the plate was thought to not appear in the American alligator at all. This produced the belief that the Chinese alligator's relationship with other crocodilians was between caimans and American alligators. Paulus Edward Pieris Deraniyagala described the genus "Caigator" the same year, which only contained the Chinese alligator, making its scientific name "Caigator sinensis". However, paleontology has shown that the Chinese alligator has evolved from other now-extinct members of the genus "Alligator". This and the fact that the American alligator does infrequently have a bony plate on its eyelid have caused "Caigator sinensis" to now be classified as a synonym of "Alligator sinensis". There is still not a consensus among biologists that the American and Chinese alligators belong to the same genus, despite multiple studies comparing the biochemistry, histology, and various other aspects of the two crocodilians.