Plateosauridae

Plateosauridae is a family of plateosaurian sauropodomorphs from the Late Triassic of Europe, Greenland, Africa and Asia. Although several dinosaurs have been classified as plateosaurids over the years, the family Plateosauridae is now restricted to Plateosaurus, Yimenosaurus, Euskelosaurus, and Issi. In another study, Yates (2003) sunk Sellosaurus into Plateosaurus. Gresslyosaurus is alternatively considered its own genus or a synonym of Plateosaurus.

Plateosauridae

FunkMonk · CC BY-SA 3.0 · 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
Also called
plateosauridPBDB
Sits inside
SauropodomorphaPBDB
Motility
actively mobilePBDB, for Osteichthyes
Environment
terrestrialPBDB, for Diapsida

Time the record covers

At least 36 million years on record.

The record covers at least 211.18 Mya to 174.7 Mya. No occurrence read is dated outside 237 Mya to 168.2 Mya.

Middle Triassic — about 0 of 72 occurrencesLate Triassic — about 65 of 72 occurrencesLate TriassicEarly Jurassic — about 6 of 72 occurrencesEarly JurassicMiddle Jurassic — about 1 of 72 occurrencesMiddle Jurassic238–236 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences236–234 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences234–231 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences231–229 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences229–226 Mya — about 2 occurrences226–224 Mya — about 6 occurrences224–222 Mya — about 6 occurrences222–219 Mya — about 6 occurrences219–217 Mya — about 6 occurrences217–215 Mya — about 6 occurrences215–212 Mya — about 6 occurrences212–210 Mya — about 6 occurrences210–207 Mya — about 6 occurrences207–205 Mya — about 6 occurrences205–203 Mya — about 6 occurrences203–200 Mya — about 4 occurrences200–198 Mya — about 0.7 occurrences198–195 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences195–193 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences193–191 Mya — about 0.5 occurrences191–188 Mya — about 0.5 occurrences188–186 Mya — about 0.5 occurrences186–184 Mya — about 0.5 occurrences184–181 Mya — about 0.5 occurrences181–179 Mya — about 0.5 occurrences179–176 Mya — about 0.5 occurrences176–174 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences174–172 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences172–169 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences169–167 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences211.18 Mya174.7 Mya238 Mya167 Mya

72 occurrences of Plateosauridae 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

72 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

23 formations

Trossingen — 49.52°N, 11.13°ETrossingen — 48.53°N, 9.05°ETrossingen — 48.75°N, 9.17°ETrossingen — 48.73°N, 9.10°ETrossingen — 51.90°N, 11.07°ETrossingen — 50.38°N, 10.55°ETrossingen — 49.06°N, 10.98°ETrossingen — 49.52°N, 11.25°ETrossingen — 49.25°N, 11.23°ETrossingen — 48.07°N, 8.65°ELöwenstein — 48.07°N, 8.65°ELöwenstein — 48.76°N, 9.14°ELöwenstein — 49.06°N, 8.98°ELöwenstein — 48.08°N, 8.64°EFeuerletten — 49.48°N, 11.22°EFeuerletten — 49.50°N, 11.28°EFeuerletten — 49.50°N, 11.43°EFeuerletten — 49.40°N, 11.25°EKlettgau — 47.50°N, 8.02°EKlettgau — 47.74°N, 8.49°EElliot — 30.53°S, 27.42°EElliot — 30.70°S, 27.23°ENavajo Sandstone — 36.66°N, 111.44°WNavajo Sandstone — 37.00°N, 112.01°WNavajo Sandstone — 37.00°N, 112.81°WMarnes irisées supérieures — 46.90°N, 5.77°EMarnes irisées supérieures — 46.84°N, 5.66°EØrsted Dal — 71.83°N, 23.51°WMalmros Klint — 71.38°N, 22.57°WCaturrita — 29.60°S, 53.86°WKnollenmergel — 47.47°N, 7.73°EGrès à Avicula contorta — 48.62°N, 6.33°EMarnes de Châlins — 46.67°N, 5.55°EWestbury — 53.03°N, 0.81°WRhätkeuper — 52.07°N, 10.68°ELunde — 61.51°N, 2.17°E? Burgsandstein — 49.45°N, 11.08°ELufeng — 25.59°N, 102.32°EGrès de Infralias — 48.01°N, 5.53°ELaguna Colorada — 48.10°S, 68.30°WAztec Sandstone — 35.43°N, 115.53°WBamberg — 50.29°N, 11.09°EZiliujing — 29.39°N, 104.82°E

Loading coastlines…

The named rock units Plateosauridae has been recovered from, largest first. Drawn where the rock is now, not where it formed. 14 occurrences have no formation on record, which is common for older literature.

Plateosauridae and its relatives

Late Triassic

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

Found in the same rock

166 taxa

The Paleobiology Database records 65 sites for Plateosauridae, and this reads all of them. The number is how many of those sites it was catalogued from too. The 24 sharing the most are listed.

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

36 references

Each of the 72 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. 24 further references are not listed. 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 content1

Picture of Plateosauridae

Credit
FunkMonk
Licence
CC BY-SA 3.0
Commercial use
the licence allows it

No 3D scan of Plateosauridae was found in MorphoSource and Sketchfab.

Smithsonian Open Access was 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 itSauropodomorpha through timeFormations of the Late TriassicThe world it lived on

Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0. Marsh 1895