Abstract
Although sauropodomorph dinosaurs have been known for a long time from the Late Triassic of central Europe, sauropodomorph diversity and faunal composition has remained controversial until today. Here we review sauropodomorph material from the Canton Schaffhausen, Switzerland. The material comes from three different but geographically close localities and represents at least three different taxa. Apart from the common genus Plateosaurus, the material includes remains of two different large, robustly built sauropodomorphs. One of these is described as a new taxon, Schleitheimia schutzi n. gen. et sp., on the basis of an unusual ilium and associated axial and appendicular material. Schleitheimia represents a derived basal sauropodiform and possibly the immediate outgroup to Sauropoda, and thus is the most derived sauropodomorph known from the Late Triassic of Europe. These results thus highlight the diversity of sauropodomorphs in the Late Triassic of central Europe and further indicate widespread sauropodomorph survival across the Triassic-Jurassic boundary.
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Article number | 8 |
| Journal | Swiss Journal of Geosciences |
| Volume | 113 |
| Issue number | 1 |
| DOIs | |
| Publication status | Published - 1 Dec 2020 |
Funding
Fieldwork was supported by the Naturforschende Gesellschaft Schaffhausen, the Lotteriefonds Kanton Schaffhausen and the Schweizerische Akademie der Naturwissenschaften. No other funding was obtained for this project. We are indebted to the late Emil Schutz, who collected much of the material described here, including the type specimen of Schleitheimia , and donated it to the PIMUZ. Martin Wäckerlin handed the MzA unpublished documents and additional fossil material from his uncle E. Schutz. Other material was collected and donated by Daniel Egger, Franz Hofmann, Rudolf Schlatter, Bruno Sommerhalder and Bruno Sternegg to the MzA. Willi Bächtold, Urs Oberli, Tobias Reich, Silvan Schaub, Rudolf Schlatter and Iwan Stössel participated in the excavation in 2016, funded by the Naturforschende Gesellschaft Schaffhausen, the Lotteriefonds Kanton Schaffhausen and the Schweizerische Akademie der Naturwissenschaften. The Canton Schaffhausen and the community of Schleitheim granted the permit. The material was prepared by Fritz Buchser, Urs Oberli and Christian Obrist. E. Schneebeli-Hermann studied some test samples on palynomorphs. Sincere thanks go to Urs Weibel for access to the material at MzA, help during collection work, and, together with Iwan Stössel, for providing measurements for the MzA specimens. We also thank Christian Klug for access to the PIMUZ collection. Andrea Villa took photographs of selected elements of Ruehleia for us. Chris Takken helped with picking microfossils and Gabriel Aguirre with the design of figures. Last, but not least, Adriana López-Arbarello and Christian Meyer are thanked for discussions, and the critical comments by two anonymous reviewers greatly helped to improve the paper.
Keywords
- Late Triassic
- Sauropod origins
- Sauropodomorpha
- Switzerland