Re: Hawkins's dinosaurs

[Dinogeorge@aol.com]

In a message dated 12/16/02 7:22:52 PM Pacific Standard Time, 
dalelemu@hotmail.com writes:

<< In the foreground, left, is a nasty looking humped beastie that might be 
 _Megalosaurus_ (although it doesn't look anything like the one they built at 
 Crystal Palace, except for the hump) >>

Speaking of the "humped" Megalosaurus, the hump is based on a specimen 
comprising three articulated dorsal vertebrae with very tall neural spines, 
discovered sometime before 1851 by gentleman fossil collector Samuel Husband 
Beckles near the site of the Battle of Hastings. This specimen eventually 
became the basis for the name of von Huene's genus Altispinax and is now the 
genoholotype specimen of the species Becklespinax altispinax. Owen thought 
the vertebrae were from the anterior dorsal series, but they are more likely 
from the posterior series, and except for the extreme elongation of the 
neural spines, second only to Spinosaurus among theropods, they are quite 
comparable with dorsals 8-10 of Piatnitzkysaurus.