On the affinities and classification of the dinosaurian reptiles / by O.C. Marsh.

  • Marsh, Othniel Charles, 1831-1899.
Date:
1895
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: On the affinities and classification of the dinosaurian reptiles / by O.C. Marsh. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.

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    [From tiie Vol. L, December, 1895.] On the Affinities and Classification of the Dinosaurian Reptiles;* by (). C. Marsh. (With Plate X.) Introduction. For several years I have been engaged in the study of the Dinosaurs of North America, and the main results of the investigation have been published both in that country and in Europe. The material for this study consisted of the exten- sive collections made during my explorations in western North America, especially in the Rocky Mountain region, and the type specimens are nearly all preserved in the museum of Yale University. I first attempted in 1881 to make a classification of the series of specimens thus secured, and in the following year I extended this classification to include the European forms, and again in 1884 I expanded it still further to include all the Dinosauria then known.f Since that time, many new discoveries have been made, and some very strange forms have been brought to light in Amer- ica, which render a revision of this classification necessary. Besides the American forms, I have studied with care nearly every important specimen of Dinosaurs preserved in the museums of Europe, and as a result of all this investigation, 1 shall present to you an abstract, bringing the subject down to date. This will include a short statement as to the affinities of the Dinosaurs, so far as I have been able to make them out, and a synopsis of the classification, based mainly upon the char- acters of the Dinosaurs I have myself examined. To bring the subject directly before you, I have prepared the chart here shown (Plate X), which gives restorations of the skeletons of the twelve best known Dinosaurs, so far as I have been able to reconstruct them. Of these twelve forms, eight are from America; AncMsaurus, a small carnivorous type from the Trias; Brontosaurus, Camptosa-urus, Laosaurus, and Stegosaurus, all herbivorous, and the carnivorous Cerato- saurus, from the Jurassic; with Claosaurus and Triceratops, herbivores from the Cretaceous. These American forms, with four from Europe, types of the well-known genera Compsog- nathus, Scelidosaurus, Ilypsilophodon, and Iguanodon, com- plete the series represented on this chart. They form together an instructive group of the remarkable Reptiles we are now considering. * Abstract of paper read before the International Congress of Zoologists, at Leyden, September 17, 1895. f This Journal, vol. xxi, p. 423, May, 1881; vol. xxiii, p. 81, January, 1882 ; Report British Association for the Advancement of Science, for 1884, p. 763. Am. Jour. Sci.—Third Series, Vol. L, No. 300.—December, 1895. 32