''Elmisaurus'' (meaning "foot sole lizard") is an

extinct Extinction is the termination of a kind of organism or of a group of kinds (taxon), usually a species. The moment of extinction is generally considered to be the death of the last individual of the species, although the capacity to breed and ...

genus Genus ( plural genera ) is a taxonomic rank used in the biological classification of extant taxon, living and fossil organisms as well as Virus classification#ICTV classification, viruses. In the hierarchy of biological classification, genus com ...

caenagnathid Caenagnathidae is a family of bird-like maniraptoran theropod dinosaurs from the Cretaceous of North America and Asia. They are a member of the Oviraptorosauria, and close relatives of the Oviraptoridae. Like other oviraptorosaurs, caenagnathids ...

dinosaur Dinosaurs are a diverse group of reptiles of the clade Dinosauria. They first appeared during the Triassic period, between 243 and 233.23 million years ago (mya), although the exact origin and timing of the evolution of dinosaurs is t ...

from the

Late Cretaceous The Late Cretaceous (100.5–66 Ma) is the younger of two epochs into which the Cretaceous Period is divided in the geologic time scale. Rock strata from this epoch form the Upper Cretaceous Series. The Cretaceous is named after ''creta'', the ...

Nemegt Formation The Nemegt Formation (also known as Nemegtskaya Svita) is a geological formation in the Gobi Desert of Mongolia, dating to the Late Cretaceous. The formation consists of river channel sediments and contains fossils of fish, turtles, crocodilian ...

Mongolia Mongolia; Mongolian script: , , ; lit. "Mongol Nation" or "State of Mongolia" () is a landlocked country in East Asia, bordered by Russia to the north and China to the south. It covers an area of , with a population of just 3.3 million, ...

. It was a

theropod Theropoda (; ), whose members are known as theropods, is a dinosaur clade that is characterized by hollow bones and three toes and claws on each limb. Theropods are generally classed as a group of saurischian dinosaurs. They were ancestrally c ...

belonging to the

Oviraptorosauria Oviraptorosaurs ("egg thief lizards") are a group of feathered maniraptoran dinosaurs from the Cretaceous Period of what are now Asia and North America. They are distinct for their characteristically short, beaked, parrot-like skulls, with or wit ...

Discovery

In 1970, a paleontological Polish-Mongolian expedition discovered two fragmentary specimens of a small theropod in the Ömnögovĭ province of

. The

type species In zoological nomenclature, a type species (''species typica'') is the species name with which the name of a genus or subgenus is considered to be permanently taxonomically associated, i.e., the species that contains the biological type specimen ...

, ''Elmisaurus rarus'', was named and described by

Halszka Osmólska Halszka Osmólska (September 15, 1930 – March 31, 2008) was a Polish paleontologist who had specialized in Mongolian dinosaurs. Biography She was born in 1930 in Poznań. In 1949, she began to study biology at Faculty of Biology and Earth Scie ...

in 1981. The generic name is derived from

Mongol The Mongols ( mn, Монголчууд, , , ; ; russian: Монголы) are an East Asian ethnic group native to Mongolia, Inner Mongolia in China and the Buryatia Republic of the Russian Federation. The Mongols are the principal member of ...

' or ', "foot sole", as the

type specimen In biology, a type is a particular wiktionary:en:specimen, specimen (or in some cases a group of specimens) of an organism to which the scientific name of that organism is formally attached. In other words, a type is an example that serves to a ...

consisted of a

metatarsus The metatarsal bones, or metatarsus, are a group of five long bones in the foot, located between the tarsal bones of the hind- and mid-foot and the phalanges of the toes. Lacking individual names, the metatarsal bones are numbered from the med ...

. The specific name means "rare" in

Latin Latin (, or , ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally a dialect spoken in the lower Tiber area (then known as Latium) around present-day Rome, but through the power of the ...

. The

holotype A holotype is a single physical example (or illustration) of an organism, known to have been used when the species (or lower-ranked taxon) was formally described. It is either the single such physical example (or illustration) or one of several ...

, ZPAL MgD-I/172, consists of a left metatarsus fused with the tarsalia. There are two

paratype In zoology and botany, a paratype is a specimen of an organism that helps define what the scientific name of a species and other taxon actually represents, but it is not the holotype (and in botany is also neither an isotype nor a syntype). Of ...

s: ZPAL MgD-I/98, consisting of a right hand and foot, and ZPAL MgD-I/20, the upper part of the left metatarsus of a larger individual.Osmólska, H. (1981). Coossified tarsometatarsi in theropod dinosaurs and their bearing on the problem of bird origins. ''Palaeontologica Polonica'' 42:79-95. In a 2001 study conducted by Bruce Rothschild and other paleontologists, 23 foot bones referred to ''Elmisaurus'' were examined for signs of

stress fracture A stress fracture is a fatigue-induced bone fracture caused by repeated stress over time. Instead of resulting from a single severe impact, stress fractures are the result of accumulated injury from repeated submaximal loading, such as running or ...

, but none were found.Rothschild, B., Tanke, D. H., and Ford, T. L., 2001, Theropod stress fractures and tendon avulsions as a clue to activity: In: Mesozoic Vertebrate Life, edited by Tanke, D. H., and Carpenter, K., Indiana University Press, p. 331-336. A second species, ''E. elegans'', was named in 1989 by

Philip J. Currie Philip John Currie (born March 13, 1949) is a Canadian palaeontologist and museum curator who helped found the Royal Tyrrell Museum of Palaeontology in Drumheller, Alberta and is now a professor at the University of Alberta in Edmonton. In the ...

.Currie, P.J. (1989). "The first records of ''Elmisaurus'' (Saurischia, Theropoda) from North America." ''Canadian Journal of Earth Sciences'' 26(6):1319-1324 This represented a North American form originally described as a species of ''

Ornithomimus ''Ornithomimus'' (; "bird mimic") is a genus of ornithomimid dinosaurs from the Late Cretaceous Period of what is now North America. ''Ornithomimus'' was a swift bipedal theropod which fossil evidence indicates was covered in feathers, equipped w ...

'' by

William Arthur Parks William Arthur Parks (11 December 1868 – 3 October 1936) was a Canadian geologist and paleontologist, following in the tradition of Lawrence Lambe. Parks was born in Hamilton, Ontario. After graduating with a Bachelor of Arts in 1892, Parks ...

in 1933, based on specimen ROM 781, a foot.Parks, W.A. (1933). New species of dinosaurs and turtles from the Upper Cretaceous formations of Alberta. ''University of Toronto Studies, Geological Series'' 34:1-33. Currie also referred the material of the American form ''

Caenagnathus ''Caenagnathus'' ('recent jaw') is a genus of caenagnathid oviraptorosaurian dinosaur from the late Cretaceous period (Campanian stage; ~75 million years ago). It is known from partial remains including lower jaws, a tail vertebra, hand bones ...

sternbergi'', based on a jaw fragment, to ''Elmisaurus elegans''. Due to their poor preservation and geographical distance from the type species, the classification of the American forms has been contentious. In 1997,

Hans-Dieter Sues Hans-Dieter Sues (born January 13, 1956) is a German-born American paleontologist who is Senior Scientist and Curator of Vertebrate Paleontology at the National Museum of Natural History of the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, DC. He receiv ...

stated that this supposed second species of ''Elmisaurus'' should be referred to ''

Chirostenotes ''Chirostenotes'' ( ; named from Greek 'narrow-handed') is a genus of oviraptorosaurian dinosaur from the late Cretaceous (about 76.5 million years ago) of Alberta, Canada. The type species is ''Chirostenotes pergracilis''. History of discovery ...

'', as ''C. elegans'',Sues, H.-D. (1997). "On ''Chirostenotes'', a Late Cretaceous oviraptorosaur (Dinosauria: Theropoda) from western North America." ''Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology'' 17(4):698-716. though this position was not accepted by Currie. Other researchers, including

Teresa Maryańska Teresa Maryańska (1937 – 3 October 2019) was a Polish paleontologist who specialized in Mongolian dinosaurs, particularly pachycephalosaurians and ankylosaurians. Peter Dodson (1998 p. 9) states that in 1974 Maryanska together with Halszka ...

, and their colleagues, followed Sues in reassigning ''E. elegans'' to ''Chirostenotes''.Maryanska, Osmolska and Wolsan, (2002). "Avialan status for Oviraptorosauria." ''Acta Palaeontologica Polonica'', 47(1): 97-116. In 2020, Gregory Funston assigned the material to the new genus and species ''

Citipes ''Citipes'' (meaning "fleet-footed") is an extinct genus of caenagnathid dinosaurs known from the Late Cretaceous (Campanian aged) Dinosaur Park of southern Alberta, Canada. It lived about 76.9–75.8 million years ago. The specializations of th ...

''. A 2021 article by Funston and colleagues suggested ''

Nomingia ''Nomingia'' is a genus of oviraptorid theropod dinosaur hailing from the Late Cretaceous Bugin Tsav Beds of Mongolia. Discovery and naming The remains, consisting of most of the vertebral column, pelvic girdle and left tibio-tarsus, holotyp ...

'' is a synonym of ''Elmisaurus''.

Classification

The

cladogram A cladogram (from Greek ''clados'' "branch" and ''gramma'' "character") is a diagram used in cladistics to show relations among organisms. A cladogram is not, however, an evolutionary tree because it does not show how ancestors are related to d ...

below follows an analysis by Longrich et al. in 2013, which found ''Elmisaurus'' to be a Caenagnathid.

References

{{Taxonbar, from=Q133081 Late Cretaceous dinosaurs of Asia Nemegt fauna Caenagnathids Fossil taxa described in 1981 Taxa named by Halszka Osmólska

Discovery

Classification

See also

References