[D] Chebsaurus algeriensis [sG] [T]
Describer
Mahammed, Läng, Mami, Mekahl, Benhamou, Bouterfa, Kacemi, Chérief, Chaouati, Taquet, 2005
Time
Jurassic Middle
Classification
Saurischia Sauropodomorpha Sauropoda Cetiosauridae
Diet
Herbivore
Fossilsite
Rouis El Djir mount, Oulakak, Sfissifa daïra, Naama wilaya, Occidental Saharan Atlas, Algeria
Info
Genus - Typespecies
‘Géant des Ksour’
Etymology
The generic name is from the Arabword Cheb, which designates a teenager, in a friendly and tenderly way in the West Algerian region (this sauropod being a juvenile), plus sauros, Greek for lizard. Specific name is fromAlgeria, referring to the site country.
Holotype. D001–01 to 78 (Fig. 2), temporarily in Sonatrach CRD, Boumerdès, Algeria; partial skeleton and cranial material of a juvenile sauropod including a part of basioccipital, a surangular and teeth.
Horizon
The site is at mid-slope of the Rouis El Djir mount on its northern hillside, in a continental detrital series from the indeterminate Middle Jurassic that overlaps the clay-limestones series from the Early Jurassic
Diagnosis
Primitive eusauropod displaying the following autapomorphies: a slender and elongated surangular; teeth crown and root with tuberculated surface; short and robust basioccipital tubera which diverge with a V-shape (60°) and are inclined at about 70° to the horizontal in caudal view (their elliptical surface is oriented with a craniodorsal long axis); the base of the postzygodiapophysial lamina of the transverse process is included within the cranial part of the postzygapophysis in lateral view; there is a small elliptical fossa caudodorsally to the lateral excavations (pseudopleurocoels) on one middle dorsal vertebra centrum.
Chebsaurus is a sauropod, because it possesses a triradiate proximal condyle of ulna with a deep radial fossa, the reduction of an olecranon process on ulna and the pedal ungual of the first digit is sickle-shaped. The authors also specify that it is an eusauropod by its teeth with V-shaped wear facets, its spatulate (D-shaped) teeth crown with a wrinkled enamel surface texture, its opisthocoelous cervical centra, its block-shaped carpal bones and its pedal nonungual phalanges broader than long.
It is not a neosauropod because the dorsal surfaces of the cervical parapophyses are excavated and they are not separated from the lateral excavation by a ridge and because it possesses marginal tooth denticles on the anterior margin of crown.
Mahammed, Läng, Mami, Mekahl, Benhamou, Bouterfa, Kacemi, Chérief, Chaouati, Taquet, 2005
Time
Jurassic Middle
Classification
Saurischia Sauropodomorpha Sauropoda Cetiosauridae
Diet
Herbivore
Fossilsite
Rouis El Djir mount, Oulakak, Sfissifa daïra, Naama wilaya, Occidental Saharan Atlas, Algeria
Info
Genus - Typespecies
‘Géant des Ksour’
Etymology
The generic name is from the Arabword Cheb, which designates a teenager, in a friendly and tenderly way in the West Algerian region (this sauropod being a juvenile), plus sauros, Greek for lizard. Specific name is fromAlgeria, referring to the site country.
Holotype. D001–01 to 78 (Fig. 2), temporarily in Sonatrach CRD, Boumerdès, Algeria; partial skeleton and cranial material of a juvenile sauropod including a part of basioccipital, a surangular and teeth.
Horizon
The site is at mid-slope of the Rouis El Djir mount on its northern hillside, in a continental detrital series from the indeterminate Middle Jurassic that overlaps the clay-limestones series from the Early Jurassic
Diagnosis
Primitive eusauropod displaying the following autapomorphies: a slender and elongated surangular; teeth crown and root with tuberculated surface; short and robust basioccipital tubera which diverge with a V-shape (60°) and are inclined at about 70° to the horizontal in caudal view (their elliptical surface is oriented with a craniodorsal long axis); the base of the postzygodiapophysial lamina of the transverse process is included within the cranial part of the postzygapophysis in lateral view; there is a small elliptical fossa caudodorsally to the lateral excavations (pseudopleurocoels) on one middle dorsal vertebra centrum.
Chebsaurus is a sauropod, because it possesses a triradiate proximal condyle of ulna with a deep radial fossa, the reduction of an olecranon process on ulna and the pedal ungual of the first digit is sickle-shaped. The authors also specify that it is an eusauropod by its teeth with V-shaped wear facets, its spatulate (D-shaped) teeth crown with a wrinkled enamel surface texture, its opisthocoelous cervical centra, its block-shaped carpal bones and its pedal nonungual phalanges broader than long.
It is not a neosauropod because the dorsal surfaces of the cervical parapophyses are excavated and they are not separated from the lateral excavation by a ridge and because it possesses marginal tooth denticles on the anterior margin of crown.