Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-8ctnn Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-25T04:12:46.913Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Of German princes and North American rivers: Harlan’s lost mosasaur snout rediscovered

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 April 2016

M.W. Caldwell  and
G.L. Bell Jr.
M.W. Caldwell*
Affiliation:
University of Alberta, Department of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences, and Department of Biological Sciences, Edmonton, Alberta, Canada T6G 2E9
G.L. Bell Jr.
Affiliation:
Guadalupe Mountains National Park, HC 60-#309, Salt Flat, Texas 79847, USA
*
* Corresponding author. Email: [email protected]

Abstract

Core share and HTML view are not available for this content. However, as you have access to this content, a full PDF is available via the ‘Save PDF’ action button.

The lost snout of Richard Harlan’s specimen of Mosasaurus missouriensis has been rediscovered in the vertebrate palaeontology collections of the Muséum national d’Histoire Naturelle (MNHN) in Paris, France. The specimen (MNHN 9587) bears the handwritten description, ‘Amérique du Nord. Par M. Harlan.’, which translated reads, ‘North America. By/From Mr. Harlan’. Accession information indicates the specimen was a gift to the museum prior to 1860 and was likely gifted from Harlan’s estate after his death. We examine the available history of the collection of the specimen present a description of the rediscovered snout, and demonstrate conclusively the conspecificity of M. maximiliani Goldfuss, 1845 and M. missouriensis (Harlan, 1834a) by providing a revised diagnosis of the taxon.

Keywords

MosasauridaeMissouritaxonomysystematicssynonymy
Type
Research Article
Information
Netherlands Journal of Geosciences , Volume 84 , Special Issue 3: Proceedings of the First Mosasaur Meeting , September 2005 , pp. 207 - 211
Copyright
Copyright © Stichting Netherlands Journal of Geosciences 2005

References

Camp, C.L., 1942. California mosasaurs. Memoirs of the University of California 13: vi + 1–67.Google Scholar
Conybeare, W.D., 1822. In: Parkinson, J. (ed.). An Introduction to the study of fossil organic remains. vii + 344 pp., London.Google Scholar
Cope, E.D., 1875. The Vertebrata of the Cretaceous formations of the West. Report of the United States Geological Survey of the Territories 2: 302.Google Scholar
Dollo, L., 1882. Note sur l’ostéologie des Mosasauridæ (sic). Bulletin du Musée d’Histoire naturelle de Belgigue 1: 55–80.Google Scholar
Goldfuss, A., 1845. Dei Schädelbau des Mosasaurus, durch Beschreibung einer neuen Art dieser Gattung erläutert. Nova Acta Academiae Caesar Leopoldino-Carolinae Germanicae Natura Curiosorum 21: 173-200 (1–28).Google Scholar
Harlan, R., 1834a. Notice of the discovery of the remains of the Ichthyosaurus in Missouri, N.A. Transactions of the American Philosophical Society 4: 405–409.Google Scholar
Harlan, R., 1834b. Announcement of the finding of Ichthyosaurus missouriensis and Basilosaurus. Bulletin de la Société géologique de France (1)4: 124.Google Scholar
Harlan, R., 1835. Critical notices of various organic remains hitherto discovered in North America. Transactions of the Geological Society of Pennsylvania 1(1): 46–112.Google Scholar
Harlan, R., 1839a. Notice of the discovery of Basilosaurus and Batrachotherium. Proceedings of the Geological Society of London 3: 23–24.Google Scholar
Harlan, R., 1839b. (Letter regarding Basilosaurus and Batrachotherium). Bulletin de la Société géologique de France (1)10: 89–90.Google Scholar
Leidy, J., 1858. (Remarks on Mosasaurus). Proceedings of the Academy of Natural Sciences Philadelphia 9: 176.Google Scholar
Muntell, G.A., 1829. A tabular arrangement of the organic remains of the county of Sussex. Transactions of the Geological Society (2)3: 201–216.Google Scholar
Russell, D.A., 1967. Systematics and morphology of American mosasaurs. Bulletin of the Peabody Museum of Natural History, Yale University 23: 1–241.Google Scholar
Von Meyer, H., 1845. (Letter to Professor Bronn). Neues Jahrbuch für Mineralogie, Geognosie und Geologie 1845: 308–313.Google Scholar
Williston, S.W., 1895. New or little known extinct vertebrates. Kansas University Quarterly 2: 83–84.Google Scholar
Zu Wied, M., 1840–41. Reise in das Innere Nord-Amerika in den Jahren 1832 bis 1834, 2 volumes. Verlag J. Holscher (Koblenz): 687 pp.Google Scholar
http://www.amphilsoc.Org/library/mole/h/harlan.htm, >Richard Harlan Journals, 1816–1817, 1833 (American Philosophical Society).Richard+Harlan+Journals,+1816–1817,+1833+(American+Philosophical+Society).>Google Scholar