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''Papiliovenator'' (meaning "butterfly hunter", after a butterfly-shaped feature on its first two dorsal vertebrae) is a genus of
The holotype, BNMNH-PV030, is a partial, semi-articulated subadult skeleton consisting of a nearly complete cranium and other postcranial bones. Uniquely, its snout was short and subtriangular, more similar to that of Early Cretaceous troodontids such as ''
troodontid
Troodontidae is a clade of bird-like theropod dinosaurs. During most of the 20th century, troodontid fossils were few and incomplete and they have therefore been allied, at various times, with many dinosaurian lineages. More recent fossil disco ...
theropod dinosaur from the Bayan Mandahu Formation
The Bayan Mandahu Formation (also known as Wulansuhai Formation or Wuliangsuhai Formation) is a geological unit of "redbeds" located near the village of Bayan Mandahu in Inner Mongolia, China Asia (Gobi Desert) and dates from the late Cretaceous ...
of Inner Mongolia
Inner Mongolia, officially the Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region, is an autonomous region of the People's Republic of China. Its border includes most of the length of China's border with the country of Mongolia. Inner Mongolia also accounts for a ...
, China. The type and only species is ''Papiliovenator neimengguensis''.
Description
The holotype, BNMNH-PV030, is a partial, semi-articulated subadult skeleton consisting of a nearly complete cranium and other postcranial bones. Uniquely, its snout was short and subtriangular, more similar to that of Early Cretaceous troodontids such as ''Mei long
''Mei'' (from Chinese 寐 mèi ''Sleepy'') is a genus of duck-sized troodontid dinosaur first unearthed by paleontologists from the Yixian Formation in Liaoning, China in 2004. ''Mei'' lived during the Early Cretaceous period. The binomial nam ...
'' than the long, low snouts of Late Cretaceous troodontids. This and other unique traits of irs skeleton suggest a high diversity of troodontid morphotypes in the Late Cretaceous Gobi Desert.
Classification
Pei ''et al.'' recover ''Papiliovenator'' as the earliest-diverging member of a clade consisting of all Late Cretaceous troodontids except for ''Almas ukhaa
''Almas'' is a genus of troodontid theropod dinosaur from the Late Cretaceous of Mongolia. It contains a single species, ''Almas ukhaa'', named in 2017 by Pei Rui and colleagues, based on a partial articulated skeleton. The only known specimen w ...
''.
References
{{Taxonbar, from=Q108760827 Troodontids Fossil taxa described in 2021