ACANTHOPHOLIS
a nodosaurid ankylosaurian dinosaur from the Late Cretaceous of England.
Pronunciation: a-kan-THOF-o-lis
Meaning: Spiny scales
Author/s: Huxley (
1867)
Synonyms: None known
First Discovery: Kent, UK
Discovery Chart Position: #26
Acanthopholis horrida
(Rough Spiny Scales)Etymology
Acanthopholis is derived from the Greek "akantha" (spine or thorn) and "pholis" (scale).
The
species epithet,
horrida, means "rough" in Latin. Huxley originally chose the masculine epithet "
horridus" when he named
Acanthopholis in 1867, but Arthur Smith Woodward emended it to "
horrida" in 1890 to match the feminine "pholis".
Discovery
The remains of
Acanthopholis were discovered between tidemarks at Copt Point in the Lower Chalk Formation, near Folkestone, Kent, UK, by commercial fossil collector John Griffiths in 1865.
The
holotype (GSM 109045—GSM 109058) consists of three teeth, a partail skull, fragments of vertebrae and numerous scutes.
Estimations
Timeline:
Era: Mesozoic
Epoch: Late Cretaceous
Stage: Albian-Cenomanian
Age range: 100-93.5 mya
Stats:
Est. max. length: 5.5 meters
Est. max. hip height: ?
Est. max. weight: 750 Kg
Diet: Herbivore
References
• Huxley TH (1867) "
On Acanthopholis Horridus, a New Reptile from the Chalk-marl".
Geological Magazine. 4 (32): 65–67. DOI: 10.1017/S001675680017102X.
• Ethbridge R (1867) "
V.— On the Stratigraphical Position of Acanthopholis Horridus (Huxley)".
Geological Magazine, 4(32): 67-69. DOI: 10.1017/S0016756800171031.
• Seeley HG (1869) "
III.— Index to the Fossil Remains of Aves, Ornithosauria, and Reptilia from the Secondary Strata arranged in the Woodwardian Museum of the University of Cambridge".
Geological Magazine, 7(67): 34-36. DOI: 10.1017/S0016756800209072. [Acanthopholis macrocercus, Acanthopholis platypus, Acanthopholis stereocercus.]
• Seeley HG (1871) "
XXXVII.— On Acanthopholis platypus (Seeley), a Pachypod from the Cambridge Upper Greensand".
Annals and Magazine of Natural History, 8(47): 305-318. DOI: 10.1080/00222937108696494.
• HG Seeley (1876) "On
Macrurosaurus semnus (Seeley), a long tailed animal with procoelous vertebrae from the Cambridge Upper Greensand, preserved in the Woodwardian Museum of the University of Cambridge".
Quarterly Journal of the Geological Society of London, 32: 440-444. DOI: 10.1144/GSL.JGS.1876.032.01-04.50.
• Seeley HG (1879) "
On the Dinosauria of the Cambridge Greensand".
Quarterly Journal of the Geological Society, 35(1–4): 591-636. DOI: 10.1144/GSL.JGS.1879.035.01-04.42. [Coins Acanthopholis eucercus.]
• Woodward AS and Sherborn CD (1890) "
A Catalogue of British Fossil Vertebrata".
Dulau & Company, 37 Soho Square, London. [Amends the epithet to horrida.]
• Nopcsa F (1902) "Notizen über cretacische Dinosaurier [Notes on Cretaceous dinosaurs]".
Sitzungsberichte der Mathematisch-Naturwissenschaftlichen Classe der Kaiserlichen Akademie der Wissenschaften, 111(1): 93-114. [Acanthopholis major, Acanthopholis curtonotus.]
• Carpenter K (2001) "Phylogenetic Analysis of Ankylosauria". Page 455–480 in Carpenter (ed.) "
The Armored Dinosaurs".
• Superbiola XP and Barrett PM (1999) "A systematic review of ankylosaurian dinosaur remains from the Albian-Cenomanian of England".
Special Papers in Palaeontology, 60(60): 177–208.
• Barrett PM and Bonsor JA (2020) "A revision of the non-avian dinosaurs
Eucercosaurus tanyspondylus and
Syngonosaurus macrocercus from the Cambridge Greensand, UK".
Cretaceous Research. 118: 104638. DOI: 10.1016/j.cretres.2020.104638. S2CID 225289654.
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Atkinson, L.
"
ACANTHOPHOLIS :: from DinoChecker's dinosaur archive".
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