Discovery Teratosaurus

life restoration

in 1860, sixt friedrich jakob von kapff @ heslacher wand near stuttgart discovered upper jaw bone of large reptile. type specimen, hermann von meyer declared distinct belodon, described , named latter type species teratosaurus suevicus. generic name derived greek τέρας, teras, [ominous birth of a] monster , sauros, lizard . specific name refers suevia. holotype, bmnh 38646, found in mittlerer stubensandstein. consists of 245 millimetres long right maxilla 6 large, 5 centimetres long, teeth, erroneously interpreted meyer left maxilla. indicates body length of 6 metres.

later authors, such kapff himself, von huene, osborn, , edwin h. colbert, incorrectly attributed postcrania of sauropodomorph dinosaur efraasia species or genus and, result, thought representative of presumed group of carnivorous prosauropoda or, alternatively, primitive theropod. following lead, many popular books in 20th century depicted teratosaurs earliest sort of large-bodied meat-eating dinosaur, walking on 2 legs , preying on prosauropods of day. thought many triassic ancestor carnosaurs of jurassic. sauropodomorph material described teratosaurus species such teratosaurus minor , teratosaurus trossingensis.

in 1985 , 1986, peter galton , michael benton independently showed teratosaurus rauisuchian, type of nondinosaurian large predatory archosaur, walking on fours, lived alongside dinosaurs during late triassic.

apart holotype , sauropodomorph fossils, teeth belonging various carnivorous archosaurs named teratosaurus species. these included teratosaurus lloydi, renaming of cladeiodon lloydi owen 1841 huene in 1908, , teratosaurus bengalensis. teratosaurus silesiacus, described in 2005 tomasz sulej on basis of left maxilla, transferred genus polonosuchus brussatte et al. in 2009.