UNGUALS

[<darren.naish@port.ac.uk>]

Matt Bonnan wrote..
 
> As far as I know, you call them phalanges and unguals.  Phalanges for
> the fingers/toes, and unguals for bony claws (claw ungual is, as I
> found out during my intial drafts of my dissertation, redundant
> redundant).  

Those familiar with dinosaur morphology, but perhaps not with that of 
mammals or other vertebrates, often think that ungual = claw. My take 
on the situation (please correct me if I'm wrong) is that unguals are 
those distal phalanges that have a visible attachment area on the palmar 
surface for the distal pad of the digit: they do not necessarily have 
anything to do with claws. Indeed, the term was first used in human 
anatomy and ungulates are so called because they walk on their 
unguals.

For what it's worth.

DARREN NAISH 
PALAEOBIOLOGY RESEARCH GROUP
School of Earth & Environmental Sciences
UNIVERSITY OF PORTSMOUTH
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