''Garrigatitan'' (meaning " garrigue giant") is a genus of titanosaurian

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 Period of the

Grès à Reptiles Formation Grès was a French haute couture fashion house founded by Madame Grès in 1942. Parfums Grès is the associated perfume house, which still exists, and is now based in Switzerland. History Germaine Émilie Krebs (1903–1993), known as Alix Bar ...

France France (), officially the French Republic ( ), is a country primarily located in Western Europe. It also comprises of Overseas France, overseas regions and territories in the Americas and the Atlantic Ocean, Atlantic, Pacific Ocean, Pac ...

. The genus contains a single species, ''Garrigatitan meridionalis.''

Discovery and naming

Between 2009 and 2012, excavations were carried out at Velaux-La Bastide Neuve by the ''Palaios'' Association and the University of Poitiers. During the excavations, the holotype of ''Garrigatitan'' was discovered along with the remains of ''

Atsinganosaurus ''Atsinganosaurus'' is a genus of titanosaurian sauropod dinosaur which existed in what is now France during the late Cretaceous period. Well-preserved remains (and the only known) of ''Atsinganosaurus'' were collected from the Grès à Reptile ...

,'' another titanosaurian. In 2021, the type species ''Garrigatitan meridionalis'' was named and described by Verónica Díez Díaz, Géraldine Garcia, Xabier Pereda Suberbiola, Benjamin Jentgen-Ceschino, Koen Stein, Pascal Godefroit and Xavier Valentin. The holotype, MMS / VBN.09.17, was found in a layer of sandstone of the ''Begudian'', the second level of the second series, dating back to the late Campanian. It consists of a sacrum belonging to an immature individual. Additional fossil material has been assigned to the species including a cervical vertebra, two

humeri The humerus (; ) is a long bone in the arm that runs from the shoulder to the elbow. It connects the scapula and the two bones of the lower arm, the radius and ulna, and consists of three sections. The humeral upper extremity consists of a round ...

, a left ilium, and a right ischial bone. Other specimens recovered include a neural spine, a right humerus, part of the right leg, and a left femur. The assigned specimens come from the third level of the second series. The fossils were found within an area of 375 square meters and a thickness of . They were not associated and presumably represent different individuals. They are all part of the ''Moulin Seigneurial de Velaux'' collection. The generic name, "''Garrigatitan''," is a combination of the

Occitan Occitan may refer to: * Something of, from, or related to the Occitania territory in parts of France, Italy, Monaco and Spain. * Something of, from, or related to the Occitania administrative region of France. * Occitan language Occitan (; o ...

"''garriga''," meaning "dry thicket", referring to a type of

Mediterranean The Mediterranean Sea is a sea connected to the Atlantic Ocean, surrounded by the Mediterranean Basin and almost completely enclosed by land: on the north by Western and Southern Europe and Anatolia, on the south by North Africa, and on the e ...

vegetation characterized by drought-resistant shrubs, and the Greek "titan", after the Greek mythological family of giants. The specific epithet, "''meridonalis''," means "southern" 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 ...

, in reference to the discovery location in southern France.

Description

Some ''Garrigatitan'' specimens regarded as subadults or adults belonged to individuals measuring long and weighing . A tentatively referred specimen belonged to an adult individual measuring about long.

Classification

Cladistic analysis of ''Garrigatitan'' shows that it belonged to the subfamily Lirainosaurinae.

References

{{Taxonbar, from=Q104434231 Titanosaurs Late Cretaceous dinosaurs of Europe Campanian life Cretaceous France Fossils of France Fossil taxa described in 2021