Guanlong wucaii and Griffin

[Adrienne Mayor <afmayor@aol.com>]

The location of the discovery of Guanlong wucalii and its unique  
crest may help explain a puzzling feature of the ancient image of the  
"gold-guarding Griffin."
I have suggested that the tale of the Griffin may have arisen when  
ancient Scythian nomadic gold-miners came across the fossils of  
dinosaurs with beaks such as Protoceratops and Psittacosaurs, the  
Jungar pterosaur, various species' nests and eggs, and other fossils  
in the Jungar, Turpan, Taklamakan, and Gobi deserts.
These nomads controlled the ancient caravan routes in and out of the  
Jungar Basin and went prospecting for gold for years at a time in the  
foothills of the Altai and Tien Shan mountains of northwest China and  
Mongolia.

They described Griffins as a kind of predatory "bird with four legs"  
that never flew, was the size of a wolf, and laid eggs in nests on  
the ground and cared for its young.

The Griffin was often depicted in artwork with a strange formation on  
its forehead. The beaked dinos have no horns, but perhaps the Griffin  
creature was a composite of several types of Jurassic-Cretaceous  
fossils observed in the deserts. I wonder if Guanlong wucaii's crest  
could have contributed the odd structure on the Griffin's head?