In Depth
The holotype remains of Asylosaurus were originally attributed to the genus Thecodontosaurus, but a review by Peter Galton saw these remains established as a new genus. The genus names means ‘unharmed/sanctuary lizard’ and this is a reference as to how this set of remains were shipped from England to the United States by Othniel Charles Marsh in the late nineteenth century. Had they have stayed with the other Thecodontosaurus fossils in England, they would have been destroyed in World War Two when the portion of the museum they were being stored was bombed.
Asylosaurus is a genus of sauropodomorph dinosaur, the forerunners to the more advanced sauropods that would become common during the Jurassic. The Asylosaurus genus may have encountered and lived alongside the other sauropodomorph genera Thecodontosaurus and Pantydraco.
Further Reading
- Notes on the remains of archosaurian reptiles, mostly basal sauropodomorph dinosaurs, from the 1834 fissure fill (Rhaetian, Upper Triassic) at Clifton in Bristol, southwest England, Peter Galton - 2007.
