AEPISAURUS
a plant-eating sauropod dinosaur from the Grès vert of Département du Vaucluse, France.
Pronunciation: EE-pee-SOR-us
Meaning: Lofty lizard
Author/s: Gervais (
1852)
Synonyms: None known
First Discovery: Vaucluse, France
Discovery Chart Position: #10
Aepisaurus elephantinus
(Lofty Elephantine Lizard)Etymology
Aepisaurus elephantinus is derived from the Greek "aipys" (lofty) and "sauros" (lizard) because of a lizard-like humerus "with a size approaching that of an elephant".
Discovery
The remains of
Aepisaurus were discovered in the Grès vert Formation at Mont Ventoux, near Bédoin, Départment du Vaucluse, Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur region of France, by Prosper Renaux (1793–1852) in 1841. Renaux was the first person to discover and study a verified dinosaur bone from the Cretaceous of Provence.
The
holotype (MNHN 1868-242) is a humerus measuring 90 cm long, with a width of 33 cm at its top end, 15 cm in the middle, and 25 cm at the bottom.
Estimations
Timeline:
Era: Mesozoic
Epoch: Early Cretaceous
Stage: Albian
Age range: 100 mya
Stats:
Est. max. length: 15 meters
Est. max. hip height: ?
Est. max. weight: 15 tons
Diet: Herbivore
References
• Gervais P (1852) "Zoologie et paléontologie française (animaux vertébrés)".
1st edition. A. Bertrand: Paris, 271 p.
• McIntosh JS (1990) "Sauropoda". Page 345-401 in Weishampel, Dodson and Osmólska (eds.) "
The Dinosauria: First Edition".
• Le Loeuff J (1993) "European titanosaurids".
Revue de Paléobiologie, Volume Spéciale, 7: 105-117.
• Glut DF (1997) "
Dinosaurs: The Encyclopedia".
• Upchurch PM, Barrett PM and Dodson P (2004) Chapter Thirteen: "Sauropoda". Page 259-322 in Weishampel, Dodson and Osmólska (eds.) "
The Dinosauria: Second Edition".
• Brignon, A. (2018) "Nouvelles données historiques sur les premiers dinosaure trouvés en France" [New historical data on the first dinosaurs found in France].
Bulletin de la Societe Geologique de France, 189(4):1-19 . DOI: 10.1051/bsgf/2018003.
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AEPISAURUS :: from DinoChecker's dinosaur archive".
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