Avalonianus
Extinct genus of reptiles
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Avalonianus is a highly dubious and possibly invalid genus of archosaur from the Late Triassic Westbury Formation of England. It was first described in 1898 by Harry Seeley with the name Avalonia,[1] but that name was preoccupied (Walcott, 1889), so Oskar Kuhn renamed it in 1961, albeit with no epithet (although Seeley added the epithet sanfordi in 1898[1]). It was thought to be a prosauropod, but later analysis revealed it was actually a chimera,[2] with the original teeth coming from a non-dinosaurian ornithosuchian (or possibly an early theropod), and later-referred post-cranial prosauropod remains (which were renamed Camelotia).[3] The only sufficient remains attributable to Avalonianus are several now lost fossil teeth from the chimera that were referred to Archosauria.
| Avalonianus Temporal range: Late Triassic, | |
|---|---|
| Scientific classification | |
| Kingdom: | Animalia |
| Phylum: | Chordata |
| Class: | Reptilia |
| Clade: | Archosauria |
| Genus: | †Avalonianus Kuhn, 1961 |
| Species: | †A. sanfordi |
| Binomial name | |
| †Avalonianus sanfordi Seeley, 1898 | |
| Synonyms | |
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