Illustration of the holotype sacrum in multiple views
Scientific classification
Domain:
Eukaryota
Kingdom:
Animalia
Phylum:
Chordata
Clade:
Dinosauria
Clade:
Saurischia
Clade:
Theropoda
Family:
†Dromaeosauridae
Genus:
†Ornithodesmus Seeley, 1887
Species:
†O. cluniculus
Binomial name
†Ornithodesmus cluniculus
Seeley, 1887
Ornithodesmus (meaning "bird link") is a genus of small, dromaeosaurid dinosaur from the Isle of Wight in England, dating to about 125 million years ago. The name was originally assigned to a bird-like sacrum (a series of vertebrae fused to the hip bones), initially believed to come from a bird[1] and subsequently identified as a pterosaur. More complete pterosaur remains were later assigned to Ornithodesmus, until recently a detailed analysis determined that the original specimen in fact came from a small theropod, specifically a dromaeosaur, making it one of the first dromaeosaurs known to science. All pterosaurian material previously assigned to this genus has been renamed Istiodactylus.
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have belonged to Ornithodesmus; rather, these must have come from a theropod closer in size to the giant Utahraptor. Ornithodesmus cluniculus was first...
bird), which he named Ornithodesmus cluniculus. The British geologist John W. Hulke suggested later that year that Ornithodesmus was a pterosaur, finding...
Lonchodraco is a genus of lonchodraconid pterodactyloid pterosaur from the Late Cretaceous of southern England. The genus includes species that were previously...
skeletons were exposed by erosion at the cliffs. In 1904 the remains of "Ornithodesmus" were uncovered by a cliff fall. Several fossil specimens were included...
it Ornithodesmus cluniculus. Seeley also reported another specimen found on the same site. He then considered it another species of Ornithodesmus. In...
genus Istiodactylus was discovered not to be a member of the genus Ornithodesmus. Remains of taxa that can be confidently assigned to Istiodactylidae...
Neovenator, Eotyrannus, Aristosuchus, Thecocoelurus, Calamospondylus, and Ornithodesmus; the ornithopods Iguanodon, Hypsilophodon, and Valdosaurus; the sauropods...
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