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Camelotia; Temporal range: Late Triassic-Early Jurassic, Rhaetian–Hettangian PreꞒ Ꞓ O S D C P T J K Pg N
	Femur
Scientific classification
Domain:	Eukaryota
Kingdom:	Animalia
Phylum:	Chordata
Clade:	Dinosauria
Clade:	Saurischia
Clade:	†Sauropodomorpha
Family:	†Melanorosauridae
Genus:	†Camelotia
Species:	†C. borealis
Binomial name
	†Camelotia borealis; Galton, 1985
Synonyms
	Avalonia Walcott, 1889 (preoccupied); Avalonianus? Kuhn, 1961 (chimera);

Camelotia (meaning "from Camelot") is a genus of sauropodomorph dinosaur from the Late Triassic or Early Jurassic in what is now England.^[1]^[2] Paleontologists are divided on which family it may belong to; in the past, Camelotia has generally been assigned to the prosauropods, but this group of primitive dinosaurs is in constant flux.^[1] The genus is now considered a member of the family Melanorosauridae, which includes the first true giant herbivorous dinosaurs.^[1]^[3]

Discovery and species

The type specimens, syntypes SAM 3449 and SAM 3450, were described and named in 1985 by Galton. They were collected from the Triassic-Jurassic Westbury Formation, dating to the latest Rhaetian-Lowermost Hettangian.^[1]^[4] The fossils includes the specimens "NHMUK PV R2870-R2874", "R2876-R2878" (holotype), with vertebrae, ribs, and parts of the pubis, ischium and hind limb.^[5] The type species, C. borealis, was first described by Galton in 1985. Dinosaurs formerly known as Avalonianus and Gresslyosaurus turned out to be Camelotia.^[6]

Description

From the fragmentary remains of Camelotia, part of the skeleton can be reconstructed. Camelotia likely had a short neck supporting a fairly large skull with small eyes. Its jaws contained many small-to-medium-sized, serrated, leaf-shaped teeth.^[7] Its hands and feet had five digits each; the hands in particular were long and narrow, and bore a large claw.^[7] The forelimbs were longer than the hindlimbs, in contrast to the more derived sauropods.^[7] It has been calculated around 10 metres (33 ft) long and to have weighed up to 2.5–3.8 metric tons (2.8–4.2 short tons).^[8]^[9]

References

^ ^a ^b ^c ^d Galton, P. M. (1985). Notes on the Melanorosauridae, a family of large prosauropod dinosaurs (Saurischia: Sauropodomorpha). Geobios, 18(5), 671-676.
^ Galton, P. M. (1998). Saurischian dinosaurs from the Upper Triassic of England: Camelotia (Prosauropoda, Melanorosaridae) and Avalonianus (Theropoda,? Carnosauria). Palaeontographica Abteilung A, 155-172.
^ Buffetaut, E., Suteethorn, V., Cuny, G., Tong, H., Le Loeuff, J., Khansubha, S., & Jongautchariyakul, S. (2000). The earliest known sauropod dinosaur. Nature, 407(6800), 72-74.
^ Lomax, D. R., & Tamura, N. (2014). Dinosaurs of the British Isles. Manchester: Siri Scientific Press.
^ STORRS, G. W. (1993). Terrestrial components of the Rhaetian (uppermost Triassic) Westbury Formation of southwestern Britain. New Mexico Museum of Natural History and Science Bulletin, 3, 447-451.
^ Galton, P. M. (2005). Bones of large dinosaurs (Prosauropoda and Stegosauria) from the Thaetic Bone Bed (Upper Triassic of Aust Cliff, southwest England. Revue de Paléobiologie, 24(1), 51.
^ ^a ^b ^c Redelstorff, R. A. G. N. A., Sander, P. M., & Galtom, P. M. (2013). Unique bone histology in partial large bone shafts from Aust Cliff (England, Upper Triassic): an early independent experiment in gigantism. Acta Palaeontologica Polonica.
^ McPhee, Blair W.; Benson, Roger B.J.; Botha-Brink, Jennifer; Bordy, Emese M. & Choiniere, Jonah N. (2018). "A giant dinosaur from the earliest Jurassic of South Africa and the transition to quadrupedality in early sauropodomorphs". Current Biology. 28 (19): 3143–3151.e7. doi:10.1016/j.cub.2018.07.063. PMID 30270189.
^ Paul, Gregory S. (2016). The Princeton Field Guide to Dinosaurs. Princeton University Press. p. 191. ISBN 978-1-78684-190-2. OCLC 985402380.