Genus
Valid Extinct

Istiodactylus

Howse et al. 2001

Istiodactylus is a genus of pterosaur that lived during the Early Cretaceous period, about 120 million years ago. The first fossil was discovered on the English Isle of Wight in 1887, and in 1901 became the holotype specimen of a new species, O. latidens, in the genus Ornithodesmus. This species was moved to its own genus, Istiodactylus, in 2001; this name is Greek for "sail finger". More specimens were described in 1913, and Istiodactylus was the only pterosaur known from three-dimensionally preserved fossils for much of the 20th century. In 2006, a species from China, I. sinensis, was assigned to Istiodactylus, but it has also been suggested to belong to a different genus.

Temporal range
Triassic
Jurassic
Cretaceous
Paleogene
Neogene
252 201 145 66 0 Ma
PBDB occurrences
6
Group
Ptérosaures
Piscivore Volant Marine
Istiodactylus
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Wikimedia
PBDB Wikipedia
Classification
Pterosauria Order
Pterodactyloidea Suborder
Pteranodontia Unranked clade
Ornithocheiroidea Superfamily
Istiodactylus Genus
Fossil sites 6 geolocated sites
Distribution
Top countries
🇬🇧 United Kingdom
5
🇨🇳 China
1
Geological formations
Wessex
4
Yixian
1
Vectis
1
Temporal distribution
Barremian (125.77–121.4 Ma)
6
Species (2)
Istiodactylus latidens 126 Ma
Istiodactylus sinensis 126 Ma
Bibliography
Original description
S. C. B. Howse, A. R. Milner, and D. M. Martill. 2001. Pterosaurs. Dinosaurs from the Isle of Wight, The Palaeontological Association, London
Bibliography (4)
S. C. Sweetman and D. M. Martill. 2010. Pterosaurs of the Wessex Formation (Earl Cretaceous, Barremian) of the Isle of Wight, southern England: a review with new data. Journal of Iberian Geology 36(2):225-242 DOI ↗
B. Andres and Q. Ji. 2006. A new species of Istiodactylus (Pterosauria, Pterodactyloidea) from the Lower Cretaceous of Liaoning, China. Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology 26(1):70-78 DOI ↗
S. C. B. Howse, A. R. Milner, and D. M. Martill. 2001. Pterosaurs. Dinosaurs from the Isle of Wight, The Palaeontological Association, London
H. G. Seeley. 1901. Dragons of the air, an account of extinct flying reptiles DOI ↗