Lametasaurus
A chimeric dinosaur genus from the Lameta Formation of India.
Lametasaurus is a dinosaur genus from India, known only from a mix of different animal parts. Its type species is L. indicus. Scientists have repeatedly changed their minds about what it was, and today it is usually considered a dubious name.
Quick Facts
- Type species
- Lametasaurus indicus
Facts from the source article.
History of discovery
Charles Alfred Matley dug up fossils near Jabalpur between October 1917 and 1919. In 1921, he reported finding what he thought were two theropod dinosaurs in the "Carnosaur Bed." He named one of them Lametasaurus indicus in 1923. The original specimen included dermal scutes, a sacrum made of at least five vertebrae (61 cm long), a pair of ilia (the left one measuring 96 cm), a tibia (58 cm long), and teeth. In 1933, Matley and Friedrich von Huene described additional remains collected by Barnum Brown, initially thought to be part of a tail club but later identified as a large osteoderm. Alick Walker designated the scutes as the lectotype in 1964, removing the teeth and bones from the type material. The type material is now lost, with no known inventory number. The taxon is generally considered a nomen dubium.
Classification
In 1921, the specimen was described within Megalosauria, but by 1923 Matley identified it as a member of the Stegosauria, which at the time included armoured dinosaurs now assigned to Ankylosauria. In 1935, Dhirendra Kishore Chakravarti contested the armoured dinosaur interpretation, claiming the specimen was a chimera including titanosaurid armor, crocodile teeth and theropod hindlimb material. By 1964, the name Lametasaurus designated the scutes only and was generally considered a member of the Nodosauridae. The pelvis and hindlimb bones were suggested in 2003 to belong to Rajasaurus. In 2008, Matthew Carrano and others discarded the possibility the scutes were ankylosaurian, stating they were probably titanosaurian, but noted comparison to Ceratosaurus osteoderms would help. Most recently, some osteoderms assigned to Lametasaurus have been suggested to show ankylosaurian synapomorphies, rendering Lametasaurus a chimera regardless of the affinities of the other material.
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