Duriavenator is a genus of theropod dinosaur that lived in what is now
England about 168 million years ago. Fossil jaw bones of a dinosaur
(illustration pictured) collected near Sherborne, Dorset, in 1882 were
considered by Richard Owen to belong to Megalosaurus bucklandii. It was
recognised as a different species by 1964, moved to M. hesperis in
1974, and moved again to its own genus, Duriavenator 'Dorset hunter', in
2008. It was about 5 to 7 m (16 to 23 ft) long and weighed about 1
tonne (2,000 lb). The upper jaw's main bone is distinctive; its upper
surface has a deep groove with numerous air-filled openings, and its
lower has smaller foramina that connected with the upper jaw's front
bone. It had about 4 teeth in the premaxilla, 14 to 16 in the rest of
the upper jaw, and 14 to 15 in the lower jaw. The long lower front
teeth may have been used for plucking and grasping food. Phylogenetic
analyses have shown it to be among the oldest tetanuran theropods, and
to belong in the family Megalosauridae.
Read more: <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Duriavenator>
_______________________________
Today's selected anniversaries:
1847:
Mexican–American War: The United States Army used artillery
to repulse the much larger Mexican army at the Battle of Buena Vista
near Saltillo.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Buena_Vista>
1941:
Plutonium was first chemically identified by chemist Glenn T.
Seaborg and his team at the University of California, Berkeley.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plutonium>
1945:
American photographer Joe Rosenthal took the Pulitzer
Prize–winning photograph Raising the Flag on Iwo Jima during the
Battle of Iwo Jima, an image that was later reproduced on the Marine
Corps War Memorial.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raising_the_Flag_on_Iwo_Jima>
2017:
Syrian civil war: Allied troops led by the Turkish Armed Forces
captured the city of al-Bab from the Islamic State.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_al-Bab>
_____________________________
Wiktionary's word of the day:
navel-gazing:
1. Contemplation of one's navel as an aid to meditation.
2. (derogatory) Excessive focus on oneself; self-indulgent
introspection.
3. (sometimes derogatory) (Disproportionate) concentration on a single
issue.
<https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/navel-gazing>
___________________________
Wikiquote quote of the day:
There is always a certain glamour about the idea of a nation
rising up to crush an evil simply because it is wrong. Unfortunately,
this can seldom be realized in real life; for the very existence of the
evil usually argues a moral weakness in the very place where
extraordinary moral strength is called for.
--W. E. B. Du Bois
<https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/W._E._B._Du_Bois>
Show replies by date