Re: Fingers crossed

["Peter Von Sholly" <vonrex@gte.net>]

I don't think ligaments simply "go" without drying up and pulling bones
about.  I am thinking of how many dinosaur skeletons I've seen with the
necks pulled way back over the body, presumably the result of after-death
constrictions.  Perhaps something similar occurs in the "hand bones"?

----------
> From: PTJN@aol.com
> To: dinosaur@usc.edu
> Cc: qilongia@yahoo.com
> Subject: Re: Fingers crossed
> Date: Tuesday, August 11, 1998 5:02 PM
> 
> In response to my original inquiry, Jamie Headden wrote:
> 
> < Once that animal died, and decomposed, the ligaments would have gone,
and
> the metacarpal, which as otherwise connected, would have been free to
shift
> about in relation to the rest of the hand.>
> 
> If the hand bones simply "shifted about" after death, the final position
of
> the fingers would be random across a preserved population.  That does not
seem
> to be the case.  The same fingers, II and II, are crossed in generally in
the
> same position.
> 
> <The same structure, incidentally, is seen in dromaeosaurs,
*Ornitholestes*,
> oviraptorosaurus as well.>>
> 
> All the more curious.