| Stephanosaurus | |
|---|---|
_marginatus_humerus_and_skin.png) | |
| Humerus and skin impression assigned toTrachodon (Pteropelyx) marginatus | |
Scientific classification | |
| Domain: | Eukaryota |
| Kingdom: | Animalia |
| Phylum: | Chordata |
| Clade: | Dinosauria |
| Clade: | †Ornithischia |
| Clade: | †Ornithopoda |
| Family: | †Hadrosauridae |
| Genus: | †Stephanosaurus Lambe, 1914 |
| Type species | |
| †Trachodon marginatus | |
| Synonyms | |
| |
Stephanosaurus (meaning "crown lizard"[1]) is adubiousgenus ofhadrosauriddinosaur with a complicatedtaxonomic history.
_marginatus_ulna_and_radius.png)
In 1902,Lawrence Lambe named a new set of hadrosaurid limb material and other bones (originallyGSC 419) from Alberta asTrachodon marginatus.[2] Paleontologists began finding better remains of hadrosaurids from the same rocks in the 1910s, in what is now known as thelate Campanian-age (Upper Cretaceous)Dinosaur Park Formation.
Lambe assigned two new skulls toT. marginatus, and based on the new information, coined the genusStephanosaurus for the species in 1914.[3] Lambe retained the original speciesmarginatus, so thetype specimen ofStephanosaurus was the original, scrappy limb bones and crushed skull fragments, not the two new skulls.
However, the limb bones and skull fragments could not be reliably said to come from the same animal as the complete skulls, or differentiated from other hadrosaurs. Because there was very little to associate the complete skulls with the scrappy earliermarginatus material, in 1923William Parks proposed a new genus and species for the skulls, with both generic and specific names honoring Lambe:Lambeosaurus lambei (type specimenNMC 2869, originally GSC 2869). Stephanosaurinae, a group which Lambe named in 1920, was also renamedLambeosaurinae.[4]