Dino card No. 0531 of 2,015

Dorygnathus

Say it: DOR-ig-NAY-thus

Name means: “spear jaw”1

Ate: FishFlying reptilesEarly JurassicNot technically a dinosaur

Dorygnathus was a flying reptile that lived during the Early Jurassic, about 180 million years ago. It had a short wingspan of around 1.5 metres (4.9 feet) and a long tail. Its most striking feature was its mouth full of large, curved fangs at the front and smaller teeth at the back.1

Fun fact: pterosaurs flew over the dinosaurs, but they were their cousins, not dinosaurs themselves.

Lived

184 to 183 million years ago3

Early Jurassic

Fossils found in

Germany (Baden-Württemberg and Lower Saxony) and Nancy, France1 2

Food

Fish1 3

Wingspan

1.5 to 1.7 m1

largest known specimen had a wingspan of 1.69 metres (5.5 feet)

Artist's life restoration of Dorygnathus — How Dorygnathus may have looked, by Dmitry Bogdanov. CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons. Scientists still argue about colours and details.

When did it live?

Triassic

Jurassic

Cretaceous

252 million years ago20114566, the asteroid

How big was it?

cool stuff

Fun facts

Dorygnathus had different kinds of teeth: four large fangs in the upper jaw and three or four in the lower jaw at the front, with smaller, straighter teeth behind. This is called heterodonty and is rare in modern reptiles.1

The fifth toe on its hind feet was unusually long and pointed sideways. Scientists think it may have supported a membrane, like the one on its wings.1

Dorygnathus was a close relative of the later pterosaur Rhamphorhynchus, and lived at the same time as another pterosaur called Campylognathoides in Germany.1

Over 50 specimens of Dorygnathus have been found, many in slate quarries. The best fossils are kept at the State Museum of Natural History Stuttgart in Germany.1

Some Dorygnathus teeth show wear from eating hard food like crustaceans or mollusks, not just fish.1

The smallest known Dorygnathus had a wingspan of 60 centimetres (2 feet). Scientists think very young juveniles could not fly far over the open sea.1

For dino experts

Scientific name: Dorygnathus
Named by: Wagner 18603
Group: Flying reptiles
Family / clade: Rhamphorhynchidae3
Classification: Pterosauria > Rhamphorhynchidae3
Age of the rocks: 184 to 183 million years (Toarcian)3
Rock formations: Posidonia Shale, Posidonienschiefer, Marne de Flize3
Countries: Germany, France3
Fossil records: 37 in the Paleobiology Database3
Discovery: The first fossils of Dorygnathus were found near Banz, Bavaria, Germany, and were described in 1830 by Carl Theodori as Ornithocephalus banthensis. In 1860, Johann Andreas Wagner gave it the name Dorygnathus, meaning 'spear jaw'.1
Still debated: Scientists still debate whether Dorygnathus walked on two legs or four. Some think it could walk on two legs because of its long tail, but most now believe all pterosaurs walked on all fours.1

Where the facts come from

Dorygnathus (en.wikipedia.org)
The Early Jurassic Pterosaur Dorygnathus Banthensis (Theodori, 1830) | The Palaeontological Association (palass.org)
Dorygnathus in The Paleobiology Database (CC BY 4.0): age, places, rock formations, classification.

Every fact on this page has a number that points to its source. If we got something wrong, sorry, we are dino fans, not a science journal. Tell us at [email protected] and we will fix it.