Avisaurus
AY-vih-SORE-us /ˌeɪvɪˈsɔːrəs/
Accepted genus
bird lizard
- avis · Latin · bird
- sauros · Greek · lizard
The name combines the Latin "avis" (bird) with the Greek "sauros" (lizard), so it means "bird lizard". Brett-Surman and Paul chose it for a bird-like fossil, a partial foot bone (tarsometatarsus), found in Montana. The type species, A. archibaldi, honours paleontologist J. David Archibald.
- Named by
- Brett-Surman and Paul
- Year named
- 1985
- Period
- Late Cretaceous
- Stages
- Campanian – Maastrichtian
- Found in
- Hell Creek Formation and Two Medicine Formation, Montana, USA
Avisaurus is an enantiornithine bird, so it is an avian dinosaur and not a non-avian one. It is known mostly from fragmentary leg and foot bones. A second species, A. gloriae, was named in 1995 from the Two Medicine Formation.