Aegirosaurus
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Aegirosaurus Temporal range: Late Jurassic-Early Cretaceous, Tithonian–Valanginian |
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| Fossil tail and fluke | |
| Scientific classification | |
| Kingdom: | Animalia |
| Phylum: | Chordata |
| Class: | Reptilia |
| Order: | †Ichthyosauria |
| Family: | †Ophthalmosauridae |
| Subfamily: | †Platypterygiinae |
| Genus: |
†Aegirosaurus Bardet & Fernandez, 2000 |
| Species: | †A. leptospondylus |
| Binomial name | |
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Aegirosaurus leptospondylus (Wagner, 1853) |
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| Synonyms | |
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Aegirosaurus is an extinct genus of platypterygiine ophthalmosaurid ichthyosaur known from the Late Jurassic and Early Cretaceous of Europe.
Originally described by Wagner (1853) as a species of the genus Ichthyosaurus (I. leptospondylus), the species Aegirosaurus leptospondylus has had an unstable taxonomic history. It has been referred to the species Ichthyosaurus trigonus posthumus (later reclassified in the dubious genus Macropterygius) in the past, and sometimes identified with Brachypterygius extremus. In 2000, Bardet and Fernández selected a complete skeleton in a private collection as the neotype for the species I. leptospondylus, as the only other described specimen was destroyed in World War II. A second specimen from the Munich collection was referred to the same taxon. Bardet and Fernández concluded that the neotype should be assigned to a new genus, Aegirosaurus. The name means 'Aegir (teutonic god of the ocean) lizard with slender vertebrae'.
Within Ophthalmosauridae, scientists once believed Aegirosaurus was most closely related to Ophthalmosaurus. However, many recent cladistic analyses found it is more closely related to Sveltonectes (and probably to Undorosaurus). Aegirosaurus lineage was found to include Brachypterygius and Maiaspondylus too, and to nest within Platypterygiinae, which is the sister taxon of Ophthalmosaurinae.
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