Pronunciation: LIEK-o-RIEN-us
Meaning: Wolf snout
Author/s: Haughton (1924)
Synonyms: Lanusaurus scalpridens (Gow 1975)
First Discovery: Cape Province, South Africa
Discovery Chart Position: #142
Lycorhinus angustidens
Way back when Sidney Haughton first described Lycorhinus, he thought it was an ancestor of modern mammals, specifically a cynodont (meaning "dog teeth"), which is not so surprising when you bear in mind its first remains amount to a single lower jaw bone complete with large, distinct, canine-like teeth or "tusks". Those features led to its name, which means "wolf snout", but with the discovery of Heterodontosaurus tucki, a well-preserved small ornithischian with similar dentition, Alfred Walter Crompton (nicknamed "Fuzz" for his woolly hair) twigged that Lycorhinus was actually a dinosaur.
Richard Anthony Thulborn wasn't kind to Heterodontosaurus. He mercilessly discarded its name and assigned its remains to Lycorhinus as Lycorhinus tucki in 1969, but no one took much notice. Then he attempted to bolster Lycorhinus once again when he coined Lycorhinus consors in 1974 for specimen NHMUK RU B54 that Kermack and Mussett found at Loosi in Lesotho in 1963–1964, which received a little more attention, but only because James Hopson was busy moving its remains to Abrictosaurus at the time!
Christopher Gow did manage to officially bulk up Lycorhinus in 1990 when he realised that an upper jaw from the Elliot Formation which he had named Lanasaurus scalpridens—from the Latin "lana" ("wool" for "Fuzz" Crompton), the Greek "sauros" (lizard), and the Latin "scalprum" (chisel), and "dens" (tooth)—in 1975, actually belonged to Lycorhinus angustidens, and ditto for Robert Broom's Lycorhinus parvidens.
Richard Anthony Thulborn wasn't kind to Heterodontosaurus. He mercilessly discarded its name and assigned its remains to Lycorhinus as Lycorhinus tucki in 1969, but no one took much notice. Then he attempted to bolster Lycorhinus once again when he coined Lycorhinus consors in 1974 for specimen NHMUK RU B54 that Kermack and Mussett found at Loosi in Lesotho in 1963–1964, which received a little more attention, but only because James Hopson was busy moving its remains to Abrictosaurus at the time!
Christopher Gow did manage to officially bulk up Lycorhinus in 1990 when he realised that an upper jaw from the Elliot Formation which he had named Lanasaurus scalpridens—from the Latin "lana" ("wool" for "Fuzz" Crompton), the Greek "sauros" (lizard), and the Latin "scalprum" (chisel), and "dens" (tooth)—in 1975, actually belonged to Lycorhinus angustidens, and ditto for Robert Broom's Lycorhinus parvidens.
(Wolf snout with constricted teeth)Etymology
Lycorhinus is derived from the Greek "lykos" (wolf) and "rhin" (snout), named for the "canine" teeth present in its lower jaw. The species epithet, angustidens, means "constricted teeth".
Discovery
The first remains of Lycorhinus were discovered in the Upper Elliot Formation at Paballong, near Mount Fletcher, Transkei (Herschel) District,
Cape Province, South Africa, by by Dr M. Ricono. The holotype (SAM-PK-K3606) is tooth-bearing bone from the left lower jaw (dentiary) with 11 teeth, a lower jaw (mandible)
Referred material:
NHMUK RU A100 (previously BMNH A100), a partial skull found by an expedition from University College London in the vicinity of the Lycorhinus angustidens type locality in 1960-1961.
BP/1/4244, a tooth-baring bone of the upper jaw (left maxilla) with 12 teeth, collected by C. Gow and J. Kitching in the early 1970s at Buck Camp in the Transkei (Herschel) District of South Africa. It was originally described as Lanasaurus scalpridens.
BP/1/5253, a tooth-baring bone of the upper jaw (left maxilla) with 15 teeth, collected by C. Gow and J. Kitching in 1984 at Bamboeskloof Farm in the Transkei (Herschel) District of South Africa.
