On a 19th Century Pterodactylus (Pterosauria) specimen held in the Natural History Museum of La Rochelle, France

Romain Vullo (1) , Jean-François Heil (2) , Michele Dunand (2)

1 Biodiversité : Interaction, Préservation, Evolution
2 Museum d'Histoire Naturelle de La Rochelle

A new specimen of the pterosaur Pterodactylus, purchased in the second half of the 19th Century by the Natural History Museum of La Rochelle and still held in that institution, is described. This previously unreported and almost complete specimen is one of the very few original pterosaur fossils from Solnhofen present in the French historical palaeontological collections. It corresponds to a large adult individual displaying some interesting anatomical details as well as a possible healed fracture of the tibia

Keywords: Pterodactylus; Pterosauria; Jurassic; Solnhofen Plattenkalk; Historical collections

Domains: Earth Sciences

Romain Vullo, Jean-François Heil, Michele Dunand. On a 19th Century Pterodactylus (Pterosauria) specimen held in the Natural History Museum of La Rochelle, France. Annales de Paléontologie, 2012, 98 (1), pp.63-69. ⟨10.1016/j.annpal.2011.11.004⟩. ⟨insu-00701045⟩