Altispinax

high spine

• alti- · Latin · high, tall
• spinax · Latin/Greek-style suffix · spine

The name means "high spine". It was coined for a large theropod because vertebrae from England, once thought to belong to the same animal, had very tall neural spines. Those vertebrae are now assigned to a different dinosaur, Becklespinax. The type of Altispinax itself is only a tooth from Germany.

Named by

von Huene

Year named

1923

Period

Early Cretaceous

Stage

Berriasian

Found in

Obernkirchen, Lower Saxony, Germany (type tooth)

The type species, Altispinax dunkeri, was first described as Megalosaurus dunkeri by Dames in 1884. It is based on a single tooth, so it is generally treated as a nomen dubium, a large theropod of uncertain affinities. The tall-spined English vertebrae once referred to Altispinax are now placed in Becklespinax altispinax (Paul, 1988). Details such as the exact stage are given with moderate confidence.