Daiting is a

municipality A municipality is usually a single administrative division having municipal corporation, corporate status and powers of self-government or jurisdiction as granted by national and regional laws to which it is subordinate. The term ''municipality' ...

in the district of Donau-Ries in

Bavaria Bavaria, officially the Free State of Bavaria, is a States of Germany, state in the southeast of Germany. With an area of , it is the list of German states by area, largest German state by land area, comprising approximately 1/5 of the total l ...

Germany Germany, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It lies between the Baltic Sea and the North Sea to the north and the Alps to the south. Its sixteen States of Germany, constituent states have a total popu ...

Archaeopteryx - Daiting Specimen

An eighth, fragmentary specimen of

Archaeopteryx ''Archaeopteryx'' (; ), sometimes referred to by its German name, "" ( ''Primeval Bird'') is a genus of bird-like dinosaurs. The name derives from the ancient Greek (''archaîos''), meaning "ancient", and (''ptéryx''), meaning "feather" ...

was discovered in the late 1980s in the somewhat younger sediments at Daiting. It is therefore known as the Daiting Specimen, and has been known since 1996 only from a cast, briefly shown at the ''Naturkundemuseum'' in

Bamberg Bamberg (, , ; East Franconian German, East Franconian: ''Bambärch'') is a town in Upper Franconia district in Bavaria, Germany, on the river Regnitz close to its confluence with the river Main (river), Main. Bamberg had 79,000 inhabitants in ...

. Long having been missing and therefore dubbed the 'Phantom', it was purchased by palaeontologist Raimund Albertsdörfer in 2009.''Archäologischer Sensationsfund in Daiting'', Augsburger Allgemeine - Donauwörth edition, published: 28 November 2009, accessed: 23 December 2009 It was on display for the first time with six other original fossils of ''Archaeopteryx'' at the '' Munich Mineral Show'' in October 2009. A first, quick look by scientists indicate that this specimen might represent a new species of ''Archaeopteryx''.''Wiedergefundener Archaeopteryx ist wohl neue Art''

Die Zeit (, ) is a German national weekly newspaper published in Hamburg in Germany. The newspaper is generally considered to be among the German newspapers of record and is known for its long and extensive articles. History The first edition of was ...

, accessed: 25 December 2009 It was found in a limestone bed that was a few hundred thousand years younger than the other finds. The quarry the specimen had been found has since been infilled. The area of the former quarry is in the possession of the municipality of Daiting, which does not have the financial means to carry out research. Daiting had expressions of interest for the area but has not decided as to whether it will sell it into private ownership.

References

Donau-Ries {{DonauRies-geo-stub