Dorsetisaurus

Dorsetisaurus is a genus of extinct lizard, known from the Late Jurassic of North America, and the Late Jurassic-earliest Cretaceous of Europe. The genus was first reported from the Early Cretaceous (Berriasian) Lulworth Formation of the Purbeck Group of Durlston Bay, in Dorset. It has also been reported from the Late Jurassic aged Alcobaça Formation of Portugal, the Aptian-Albian Dzunbain Formation of Mongolia, and the Morrison Formation of Western North America present in stratigraphic zones 2, 4, and 5. It is considered the oldest widely accepted member of Anguimorpha. based on the presence of 11 shared synapomorphies.

Dorsetisaurus

The Trustees of the Natural History Museum, London · CC BY 4.0 · via Wikipedia/Commons. May be a photograph of a specimen, or an artist’s reconstruction — an interpretation of a skeleton, since colour and soft tissue are almost never preserved.

On record

Recorded, not inferred
Sits inside
DorsetisauridaePBDB
Motility
actively mobilePBDB, for Osteichthyes
Environment
terrestrialPBDB, for Amniota

Time the record covers

At least 29 million years on record.

The record covers at least 149.2 Mya to 119.57 Mya. No occurrence read is dated outside 154.8 Mya to 110.1 Mya.

Late Jurassic — about 8 of 15 occurrencesLate JurassicEarly Cretaceous — about 7 of 15 occurrencesEarly Cretaceous156–154 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences154–153 Mya — about 0.7 occurrences153–151 Mya — about 0.7 occurrences151–149 Mya — about 0.7 occurrences149–148 Mya — about 1 occurrence148–146 Mya — about 2 occurrences146–145 Mya — about 1 occurrence145–143 Mya — about 1 occurrence143–142 Mya — about 0.8 occurrences142–140 Mya — about 2 occurrences140–139 Mya — about 2 occurrences134–132 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences132–131 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences131–129 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences129–128 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences128–126 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences126–125 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences120–119 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences119–117 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences117–115 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences115–114 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences114–112 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences112–111 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences111–109 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences149.2 Mya119.57 Mya155.7 Mya109.2 Mya

15 occurrences of Dorsetisaurus on record, most of them in the Late Jurassic. Bar height is expected occurrences, not a count: each fossil is spread across the span it is dated to, so a tall narrow bar means tight dating and a low wide one means loose.

When

15 occurrences

These are dates about fossils, not the animal: the record can only begin after it arose and end before it died out, so either end may reach further. Shares are expected occurrences: a fossil dated to a span is counted partly in each period it straddles. More on what this infers.

Found in

5 formations

Morrison — 41.89°N, 106.00°WMorrison — 40.50°N, 109.17°WMorrison — 39.15°N, 108.77°WMorrison — 40.30°N, 108.57°WLulworth — 50.60°N, 1.97°WWeald Clay — 50.96°N, 0.12°WAlcobaça — 39.70°N, 8.80°WDzunbain — 42.45°N, 102.42°E

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The named rock units Dorsetisaurus has been recovered from, largest first. Drawn where the rock is now, not where it formed.

Dorsetisaurus and its relatives

Late Jurassic

Where Dorsetisaurus and its relatives were recorded in the Late Jurassic.

Found in the same rock

331 taxa

The Paleobiology Database records 14 sites for Dorsetisaurus, and this reads all of them. The number is how many of those sites it was catalogued from too. The 24 sharing the most are listed.

This is not a list of everything alive at the time. It is only what has come out of the same ground as this animal and been written down.

Entered from

11 references

Each of the 15 occurrences read was entered from one of these publications, ordered by how many each accounts for. This is not a search for papers mentioning the name. Entries link to doi.org where the Paleobiology Database holds an identifier, and to its own record where it does not. Relayed as the Paleobiology Database holds them, not checked against what they resolve to.

Media and terms

Media content1

Picture of Dorsetisaurus

Credit
The Trustees of the Natural History Museum, London
Licence
CC BY 4.0
Commercial use
the licence allows it

No 3D scan of Dorsetisaurus was found in Sketchfab.

Smithsonian Open Access and MorphoSource were not reached for this taxon, so this list is what the others held rather than everything there is.

The description on this site

Licence
CC BY-SA 4.0

This is what the site found, which is not the same as what exists.

Keep going

What may have been alongside itDorsetisauridae through timeFormations of the Late JurassicThe world it lived on

Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0. Hoffstetter 1967