Animalia > Chordata > Saurornithoididae > Scipionyx

Scipionyx

Wikipedia Abstract

Scipionyx (pronounced "SHIH-pee-oh-nicks" or "ship-ee-OH-nicks") is a genus of compsognathid theropod dinosaur from the Early Cretaceous of Italy, around 113 million years ago. There is only one fossil known of Scipionyx, discovered in 1981 by an amateur paleontologist and brought to the attention of science in 1993. In 1998 the type species Scipionyx samniticus was named, the generic name meaning "Scipio's claw". The find generated much publicity because of the unique preservation of large areas of petrified soft tissue and internal organs such as muscles and intestines. The fossil shows many details of these, even the internal structure of some muscle and bone cells. Also it was the first dinosaur found in Italy. Because of the importance of the specimen it has been intensely studied.
View Wikipedia Record: Scipionyx

Species

External References

Species taxanomy provided by GBIF Secretariat (2022). GBIF Backbone Taxonomy. Checklist dataset https://doi.org/10.15468/39omei accessed via GBIF.org on 2023-06-13; License: CC BY 4.0