Heptasteornis
Heptasteornis is a dubious genus of alvarezsaurid dinosaur from the Late Cretaceous. The type (and only known) species is Heptasteornis andrewsi, described as a presumed gigantic prehistoric owl in 1975. It was previously included in Elopteryx nopcsai and indeed the holotypes of both species were believed to be from the same individual as they were discovered, and initially were assigned the same specimen number. This appears to be in error however (see below).
Article
2 sectionsContents
- References
- Bibliography
Heptasteornis is a dubious genus of alvarezsaurid dinosaur from the Late Cretaceous. The type (and only known) species is Heptasteornis andrewsi, described as a presumed gigantic prehistoric owl in 1975. It was previously included in Elopteryx nopcsai and indeed the holotypes of both species were believed to be from the same individual as they were discovered, and initially were assigned the same specimen number. This appears to be in error however (see below).
thumb|left|Life reconstruction of Heptasteornis as an alvarezsaurid The material was discovered in Romania by Franz Nopcsa, in the late Maastrichtian Sânpetru Formation (Rognacian faunal stage, deposited approximately 68 - 66 million years ago) of the Haţeg Basin in Transylvania. The scientific name as a whole means "C.W. Andrews' Transylvanian bird", after the namer of Elopteryx, and Ancient Greek hepta (ἑπτά) "seven" + asty (άστυ) "city" + ornis (όρνις) "bird"; the Latin septum urbium or the German Siebenbürgen - meaning "seven cities" or "seven castles" - were common names for the Transylvanian region throughout the centuries.