Herrerasaurus

Herrerasaurus is likely a genus of saurischian dinosaur from the Late Triassic period. Measuring 6 m (20 ft) long and weighing around 350 kg (770 lb), this genus was one of the earliest dinosaurs from the fossil record. Its name means "Herrera's lizard", after the rancher who discovered the first specimen in 1958 in South America. All known fossils of this carnivore have been discovered in the Ischigualasto Formation of Carnian age in northwestern Argentina. The type species, Herrerasaurus ischigualastensis, was described by Osvaldo Reig in 1963 and is the only species assigned to the genus. Ischisaurus and Frenguellisaurus are synonyms.

Herrerasaurus

★Kumiko★ · CC BY-SA 2.0 · via Wikipedia/Commons. May be a photograph of a specimen, or an artist’s reconstruction — an interpretation of a skeleton, since colour and soft tissue are almost never preserved.

On record

Recorded, not inferred
Sits inside
HerrerasauridaePBDB
Motility
actively mobilePBDB, for Osteichthyes
Environment
terrestrialPBDB, for Diapsida
Length
3 mWikidata

Time the record covers

At most 9.7 million years on record.

Every occurrence read is dated to somewhere between 237 Mya and 227.3 Mya, and nothing in the dating separates them, so that window is what the record shows rather than a span.

Middle Triassic — about 0 of 11 occurrencesLate Triassic — about 11 of 11 occurrencesLate Triassic237–237 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences237–236 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences236–236 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences236–236 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences236–235 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences235–235 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences235–235 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences235–234 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences234–234 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences234–234 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences234–233 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences233–233 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences233–233 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences233–232 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences232–232 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences232–231 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences231–231 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences231–231 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences231–230 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences230–230 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences230–230 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences230–229 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences229–229 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences229–229 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences229–228 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences228–228 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences228–228 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences228–227 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences237.5 Mya226.8 Mya

11 occurrences of Herrerasaurus on record, most of them in the Late Triassic. Bar height is expected occurrences, not a count: each fossil is spread across the span it is dated to, so a tall narrow bar means tight dating and a low wide one means loose.

When

11 occurrences

These are dates about fossils, not the animal: the record can only begin after it arose and end before it died out, so either end may reach further. Shares are expected occurrences: a fossil dated to a span is counted partly in each period it straddles. More on what this infers.

Found in

1 formation

Ischigualasto — 31.10°S, 68.90°WIschigualasto — 30.13°S, 68.28°WIschigualasto — 30.14°S, 67.88°WIschigualasto — 29.22°S, 68.70°W

Loading coastlines…

The named rock units Herrerasaurus has been recovered from, largest first. Drawn where the rock is now, not where it formed.

Herrerasaurus and its relatives

Late Triassic

Where Herrerasaurus and its relatives were recorded in the Late Triassic.

Found in the same rock

10 taxa

The Paleobiology Database records 11 sites for Herrerasaurus, and this reads all of them. The number is how many of those sites it was catalogued from too.

This is not a list of everything alive at the time. It is only what has come out of the same ground as this animal and been written down.

Entered from

6 references

Each of the 11 occurrences read was entered from one of these publications, ordered by how many each accounts for. This is not a search for papers mentioning the name. Entries link to doi.org where the Paleobiology Database holds an identifier, and to its own record where it does not. Relayed as the Paleobiology Database holds them, not checked against what they resolve to.

Media and terms

Media content2

Picture of Herrerasaurus

Credit
★Kumiko★
Licence
CC BY-SA 2.0
Commercial use
the licence allows it

3D model

Source
Sketchfab
Credit
PaleoMari
Licence
CC Attribution
Commercial use
cannot be read from the licence given — check the record

Smithsonian Open Access and MorphoSource were not reached for this taxon, so this list is what the others held rather than everything there is.

The description on this site

Licence
CC BY-SA 4.0

This is what the site found, which is not the same as what exists.

Keep going

What may have been alongside itHerrerasauridae through timeFormations of the Late TriassicThe world it lived on

Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0. Reig 1963