Re: Saurus plurals

["Thomas R. Holtz, Jr." <th81@umail.umd.edu>]

At 05:53 PM 7/21/99 EDT, Dinogeorge wrote:
>In a message dated 7/21/99 4:37:33 PM EST, qilongia@yahoo.com writes:
>
><< Dinogeorge has expounded on the -orum, -arum
> convention in taxa names, effectively derived from the
> Latin *sorum*, a heap or pile, or bunch, of something
> (or someONES). >>
>
>Don't know whether this is true;

I agree, and expect it really doesn't have anything to do with heaps or piles.

>There is one dinosaur name, 
>Iguanodon exogyrarum, whose species epithet derives from a genus of some kind 
>of shell named Exogyra that is plentiful in the marine-fossil layer wherein 
>the fossil was found.

As an aside, _Exogyra_ is one of the most common bivalves of the Cretaceous:
it is a coiled oyster (an oyster that lived in soft substrates rather than
growing on hard surfaces).

                        Thomas R. Holtz, Jr.
                        Vertebrate Paleontologist
Department of Geology                   Director, Earth, Life & Time Program
University of Maryland                  College Park Scholars
College Park, MD  20742       
Webpage: http://www.geol.umd.edu        Phone:301-405-4084
Email:tholtz@geol.umd.edu               Fax:  301-314-9661