Saurophaganax

Saurophaganax ("lord of lizard-eaters") is a dubious, chimeric genus of large saurischian dinosaur, possibly a sauropod, from the Late Jurassic (Kimmeridgian) Morrison Formation of Oklahoma, United States. This taxon was historically considered to represent a species of Allosaurus or very large allosaurid. However, re-examinations of the attributed specimens suggested that it is a chimera of multiple dinosaur genera, since some specimens most likely belong to a diplodocid sauropod, while the other referred specimens could be reassigned to a novel species of Allosaurus.

==Discovery and naming== thumb|left|A drawer of vertebrae historically assigned to Saurophaganax, Oklahoma Museum of Natural History In 1931 and 1932, John Willis Stovall uncovered remains of a large theropod near Kenton in Cimarron County, Oklahoma in layers of the late Kimmeridgian. In 1941, these were named Saurophagus maximus by Stovall in an article by journalist Grace Ernestine Ray. The generic name is derived from Greek , ', "lizard", , ', "to eat", with the compound meaning of "lizard eater". The specific epithet maximus means "the largest" in Latin. Because the naming article did not contain a description, the name remained a nomen nudum. In 1987, Spencer George Lucas erroneously made OMNH 4666, a tibia, the lectotype, unaware that Saurophagus was a nomen nudum.