[N] 2006 Torvosaurus tanneri reported from outside North America
Mateus, O., Walen, A. and Antunes, M.T. (2006) The large theropod fauna of the Lourinhã Formation (Portugal) and its similatiry to the Morrison Formation, with a description of a new species of Allosaurus. In Foster, J.R. and Lucas, S. G. R.M., eds., 2006, Paleontology and Geology of the Upper Jurassic Morrison Formation. New Mexico Museum of Natural History and Science Bulletin 36.
The presence of Torvosaurus in Portugal is the only one report outside North America. Torvosaurus was reported previously by Mateus and Antunes (2000) based on a large tibia from Casal do Bicho (ML430) and now by cranial material from Praia da Vermelha (Lourinhã Formation, Porto Novo Member, Kimmeridgian).
Description: A left maxilla (ML1100; figure 6) was collected by Aart Walen at Praia da Vermelha on July, 27, 2003. More recently, part of a proximal caudal vertebra and part of an unidentified limb bone from the same individual were also recovered.
The maxillary body is robust. The maxilla is almost complete, lacking about 8 cm of the ventroposterior rim. Eight tooth alveolae are present and the presence of two more can be estimated. Interdental plates are fused. The Portuguese specimens can be ascribed to the genus Torvosaurus because the last tooth position is anterior to the orbit, the antorbital foramen is absent, there is no pneumatisation of the maxillary ascending process, the maxillary ascending process is positioned posteriorly, and the tibia is stout. There are some differences between ML1100 (Portugal) and BYU725 (Colorado), the most striking being the maxillary tooth count. The Portuguese specimen had 10 teeth while BYU725 had 11 to 13 maxillary teeth. The alveoli are larger in the Portuguese specimen. Despite the differences, the Portuguese specimen can be ascribed to Torvosaurus tanneri.
The maxilla from Praia da Vermelha is 63 cm long, hence the skull length can be estimated as about 158 cm (T. tanneri BYU 725 has a 118 cm skull for a 47 cm long maxilla, Britt, 1991). This points out to the largest known Jurassic theropod, followed by some specimens of Allosaurus (Saurophaganax) maximus and Edmarka rex. The skull size is similar to some of the largest Tyrannosaurus rex. The erupted tooth crown is 127 mm long. A distal end of a large femur (ML 632, from Quinta do Gradil) tentatively attributed to Torvosaurus indicates an individual more than 11meters long whose weight may be estimated at 1930 kg (Anderson et al., 1985), similar to the mass estimates for the Morrison Torvosaurus. (Mateus, Walen and Antunes 2006)