DICLONIUS
a dubious hadrosaurid dinosaur from the Late Cretaceous of Canada.
Pronunciation: die-KLOH-nee-us
Meaning: Double sprout
Author/s: Cope (
1876)
Synonyms: Trachodon pentagonus (Cope, 1876)
First Discovery: Montana, USA
Discovery Chart Position: #40
Diclonius pentagonus
(Double sprouting teeth with five corners)Etymology
Diclonius is derived from the Greek "di-" (two) and "klon" (sprout, twig), not for its double-rooted teeth as once assumed, but in reference to the method of tooth replacement, in which a new tooth "sprouted" from the rear of a worn tooth and both were functional until the new eventually replaced the old.
The
species epithet,
pentagonus, means "five cornered", presumably referring to the five "corners" of the tooth outline, two of which are the result of damage.
Discovery
The remains of
Diclonius were discovered in the Judith River Formation at Dog Creek, Montana, USA.
It was named in the strength of two teeth and two scraps that are barely indentifiable as tooth fragments by Cope in 1876. But O.P Hay designated one of the teeth as the
holotype (AMNH 3972) in 1902.
Estimations
Timeline:
Era: Mesozoic
Epoch: Late Cretaceous
Stage: Campanian
Age range: 75 mya
Stats:
Est. max. length: ?
Est. max. hip height: ?
Est. max. weight: ?
Diet: Herbivore
References
• Cope ED (1876) "
Descriptions of some vertebrate remains from the Fort Union Beds of Montana".
Proceedings of the Academy of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia, 28: 248-261.
• Cope ED (1883) "The structure and appearance of the Laramie dinosaurian".
American Naturalist, 37: 774-777.
• Hay OP (1902) "Bibliography and catalogue of the fossil Vertebrata of North America".
U.S. Geological Survey Bulletin, 179: 1-868.
• Sternberg CM (1936) "The systematic position of Trachodon".
Journal of Paleontology, 10(7): 652-655.
• Coombs W (1988) "The status of the dinosaurian genus
Diclonius and the taxonomic utility of hadrosaurian teeth".
Journal of Paleontology, 62: 812-817.
• Creisler BS (1992) "Why
Monoclonius Cope Was Not Named for Its Horn: The Etymologies of Cope's Dinosaurs".
Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology, 12(3): 313–317. DOI: 10.1080/02724634.1992.10011462.
• Glut DF (1997) "
Dinosaurs: The Encyclopedia".
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Atkinson, L.
"
DICLONIUS :: from DinoChecker's dinosaur archive".
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