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Visitor Submit | The Crystal Palace Dinosaurs: The place are they now? by Sam Brilliant – Love within the Time of Chasmosaurs

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    Right this moment, we welcome Sam Brilliant to the weblog for a visitor put up on the Crystal Palace dinosaurs.

    A current Earth Sciences graduate from UCL, Sam labored on the holotype specimen of the ankylosaur Hylaeosaurus for his Masters thesis, utilizing X-Ray tomography to explain its bizarrely-preserved cranium. Since graduating he largely spends his time shuttling to and from London, the place he continues to be based mostly part-time, and his house in Dorset. Observe Sam on Twitter @pipedreamdino, or try his folks band’s Instagram @for.folks.sake.


    Victorian Britain was the time and place through which palaeontology started to emerge as a real and unbiased scientific self-discipline, and it supplied a romantic and infrequently troublesome surroundings for our early understanding of dinosaurs. Tasked with making sense of recent discoveries from Britain and the Continent, early palaeontologists (often both docs or aristocrats) started to reply essentially the most primary of questions: what have been these reptiles, and why do they now not reside in our world? Can we describe them in an identical method to dwelling creatures, and the way in that case? The lattermost query led to a flurry of makes an attempt to make use of modern organic information to realize perception into what extinct animals could have seemed like when alive.

    The megalosaurus sculpture at the Crystal Palace

    The iguandon pair at the Crystal Palace

    The Hylaeosaurus sculpture at the Crystal Palace

    The Crystal Palace Dinosaurs as seen through the years and seasons. From high: Megalosaurus in summer season, 2022; Hylaeosaurus in autumn, 2022; the 2 Iguanodon in summer season, 2020. Images by Sam Brilliant.

    The ball had quickly been set rolling. Illustrations of long-extinct crops and animals, alive and reconstructed of their pure habitat, grew to become in vogue for his or her extravagant and infrequently fanciful show of historical worlds. This took on a brand new substance within the early 1850s, when the acme for palaeoart was propelled from drawings to 37 (probably extra; Witton and Michell, 2022) life-size, anatomically to-the-letter statues; these have been constructed to accompany the everlasting re-opening of the Crystal Palace, just lately having been moved from Hyde Park to a specially-created panorama near Sydenham in South London. These sculptures, a part of a wider Geological Courtroom through which one might traverse prehistory from the Palaeozoic via to the Ice Age, have been for essentially the most half the brainchild of Benjamin Waterhouse Hawkins (the extent to which one Sir Richard Owen was concerned is debated [Cadbury, 2000; Witton and Michel, 2022]). They’re additionally distinctive amongst publicly-displayed prehistoric statues in that they’re thought to signify, as shut as is feasible, modern consensus on what palaeontologists thought these taxa seemed like (Naish 2015). On the most important of the islands is the centrepiece of this unusual and largely untouched show; 4 dinosaur sculptures making up three completely different genera. These taxa – Iguanodon, Megalosaurus and Hylaeosaurus – should not simply traditionally essential for his or her place amongst these sculptures, but additionally as constituent members of a dinosaurian founders’ membership. Collectively they make up a triumvirate of taxa, from which Owen used to coin the time period Dinosauria (Owen, 1842).

    Cartoon illustration of three Crystal Palace Dinosaurs in anthropomorphized form, in fancy Victorian era suits.

    Sketch of the Crystal Palace Dinosaurs as ‘founding members’ – a Victorian eccentricity with classes to show in regards to the historical past of palaeontology. Drawing by Rose Meadows.

    A lot has been written through the years regarding the historical past and significance of the Crystal Palace sculptures. Most just lately, Mark Witton and Ellinor Michel wrote a complete guide in regards to the Geological Courtroom (Witton and Michel, 2022). I’d wish to steal a little bit little bit of your time as a way to shine a light-weight on how these dinosaurs have been doing since their snapshot second in Crystal Palace. With the present revival of curiosity in these sculptures as monuments to the historical past of palaeontology, the time is ripe to focus on the historical past of those fascinating, typically enigmatic genera, with the view of reintroducing them into the general public sphere (the place they’re typically overshadowed by bigger, extra charming dinosaurs from North America).

    Iguanodon

    Iguanodon might be the star of the present in the case of the Crystal Palace sculptures – partly (I suppose?) as a result of there are two of them, and partly due to semi-fictional tales about nostril horns and banquets hosted in one in all their bellies. I feel the important thing factor in regards to the present science of Iguanodon, as we see it at Crystal Palace, is that the specimens that Hawkins based mostly the sculptures from are now not labeled within the genus Iguanodon. This isn’t to say that no British iguanodontid specimens are Iguanodon anymore, however the ones that stay within the taxon weren’t even found till 20 years after the sculptures have been constructed (Witton and Michel, 2021), and so couldn’t have been utilized by Hawkins as references when constructing the Crystal Palace sculptures. Iguanodon anglicus, now a nomen dubium, was the identified species of Iguanodon again within the 1850s, and the entire materials identified from that point belongs to different iguanodontids or is taken into account indeterminate.

    Iguanodontid systematics are always below revision, with nice work at the moment being completed at London’s Pure Historical past Museum, but it surely’s secure for now to say that many of the specimens consulted by Hawkins at the moment are labeled within the species Barilium dawsoni (previously Iguanodon dawsoni). This species was first recognised as separate from the unique Iguanodon materials by Richard Lydekker in 1888, who selected to erect a brand new species of Iguanodon somewhat than shove it into a brand new genus. Nonetheless, the flip of the twenty first century started a time of main splitting of iguanodontians. Questionable and nonetheless hotly-debated choices have been made, such because the Worldwide Fee on Zoological Nomenclature (ICZN)’s referral of Iguanodon to I. bernissatensis sort specimens in Belgium (once more, described within the Eighties) somewhat than the unique, extra fragmentary English materials from the 1820s. I’ve heard from a number of folks that the holotype actually should have remained the holotype, though it’s a fairly undiagnostic piece of vertebra, so Iguanodon most likely would’ve been pronounced taxonomically useless if it wasn’t for the swap to the Belgian sort specimen. Virtually all English specimens of Iguanodon have been break up into completely different genera, most famously Mantellisaurus (Paul, 2007), which options barely into the Crystal Palace chimeras. Nonetheless, it’s Barilium that dominates right here. What may be mentioned about Barilium? Nicely, it’s an eight metre-long, medium-sized iguanodontid, differentiated from different intently associated genera (together with Iguanodon) based mostly on some very minor variations… iguanodontids are peculiar issues.

    Painting of the ornithopod dinosaur Iguanodon walking in front of a blue sky.

    Fashionable interpretation of Barilium dawsoni, the English iguanodontid taxon making up nearly all of the Crystal Palace “Iguanodon”. Paintings by Mark Witton. Used with permission from the creator.

    Megalosaurus

    For the higher a part of half a century Megalosaurus, the primary formally described dinosaur taxon (Buckland, 1824), was the staple of Victorian horror in regards to the primordial world. It’s forgotten at this time that this was the case, however this taxon crops up in cultural mainstays of the nineteenth century a lot that it was primarily a family title. A passage from the opening of Dickens’ Bleak Home is oft-quoted, however calls for point out right here:

    “London. Michaelmas time period these days over, and the Lord Chancellor sitting in Lincoln’s Inn Corridor. Implacable November climate. As a lot mud within the streets as if the waters had however newly retired from the face of the earth, and it could not be great to satisfy a Megalosaurus, forty toes lengthy or so, waddling like an elephantine lizard up Holborn Hill.”

    That is typically thought of the primary identified reference to a selected dinosaur within the literary canon. Nonetheless, for credit score the place credit score is due, that is seemingly not true; an article mentioning Megalosaurus (titled Our Phantom Ship on an Antediluvian Cruise) was printed by Henry Morley about six months earlier within the journal Family Worlds, the editor of which was Dickens himself (Moskovitz, 2011).

    Since these early days, together with its starring position in Crystal Palace, Megalosaurus has had a tricky time protecting its stature inside dinosaurian canon. What has actually plagued altering scientific perceptions of Megalosaurus is our lack of knowledge on the genus compared with later theropod discoveries. For the reason that description of the sort species, M. bucklandii, many extra fragmentary fossil specimens have been assigned to the genus as an ensemble forged of various species. Inevitably, this led to Megalosaurus changing into one thing of a wastebasket taxon, with primarily any Jurassic-age English theropod being assigned to the genus. This meant that the true variety of English theropods was wrapped up inside one taxon for fairly some time, compounded by the issue of British fossils hardly being unearthed in a remotely full state (of the 100 or so British species of dinosaur identified to science, solely three are identified from virtually full skeletons: Hypsilophodon, Scelidosaurus and Mantellisaurus). Shifting down the listing of ex-Megalosaurus taxa, some relative heavyweights of British dinosaurs are discovered – Proceratosaurus and Metriacanthosaurus for instance. However the listing extends exterior of the British Isles, and even exterior of Europe – Carcharadontosaurus of bigger-than-T. rex fame might be essentially the most well-known taxon as soon as belonging to Megalosaurus, however different far-flung specimens from Tanzania and even India have been as soon as thrown into the genus. The idea of a cosmopolitan Megalosaurus, as this would appear to indicate, isn’t fairly as ridiculous because it sounds when you think about the wide-ranging habitat distributions many mammalian predators had earlier than the Holocene. Nonetheless, a set of anatomical variations separated these specimens, and so the collapse of the Megalosaurus empire and all its constituent species was inevitable from the beginning. Right this moment solely M. bucklandii is recognised as belonging to the genus, and materials for this species stays scant. Because of this, Megalosaurus continues to be styled in palaeoart after comparable theropods that have been as soon as assigned to it, comparable to Torvosaurus.

    Regardless of these caveats, we all know sufficient about Megalosaurus to make some generalisations about its look and way of life. Though medium-sized for theropods total, it’s one of many largest Center Jurassic theropods identified, and is regarded as strong in comparison with early theropods of an identical measurement, with mass estimates simply shy of 1 tonne (Benson, 2010). It’s fairly essential to have the ability to make these generalisations, as Megalosaurus is the namesake of the household Megalosauridae, and thru this semantic the taxon stays a benchmark for comparisons with different megalosaurid theropods.

    Painting of the theropod dinosaur Megalosaurus bent over a dead animal, feeding.

    Fashionable interpretation of Megalosaurus bucklandii consuming its fill, because it certainly should have in its time as apex predator of Center Jurassic Britain. Paintings by Mark Witton. Used with permission from the creator.

    Hylaeosaurus

    I feel that Hylaeosaurus has all the time been essentially the most criminally ignored of our three founding dinosaur taxa. Why did this dinosaur by no means ‘take off’? This has been advised to be because of a mixture of things: an absence of knowledge on this dinosaur, the problem of gaining new information, and its place because the sufferer of potential synonymy with its extra well-known relative Polacanthus.

    Issues began off fairly sourly for the debut of Hylaeosaurus on the islands of Crystal Palace. For one factor, it was positioned dealing with away from the view of the walkway, its head (now a reproduction) simply out of view. It has been intuitively advised that this was as a result of Hawkins needed to cover the entrance finish of the sculpture, as the one specimen at the moment identified to Hylaeosaurus, described in 1833 by Mantell, has such a multitude of a preserved cranium that no one had a clue what its head seemed like. Nonetheless, this speculation has grow to be an unlikely prospect (Witton, 2018), as through the creation of the Crystal Palace sculptures Hawkins used a number of completely different specimens (then assigned to Hylaeosaurus [Owen, 1842c]) for reference, together with part of a decrease jaw and a few tooth fragments. Right this moment these fragments are thought of to belong to non-ankylosaurian dinosaurs (Upchurch et al., 2011; Barrett and Maidment, 2011; Witton and Michel, 2021), but it surely stays that summing this materials collectively provides an identical quantity of cranium materials for Victorian Hylaeosaurus as was identified for Megalosaurus, which Hawkins had no such bother exhibiting off the cranium for.

    New Hylaeosaurus specimens have been onerous to come back by. The Sussex quarry through which the holotype was found has lengthy since been infilled, and an issue with British dinosaurs usually is that a lot of the UK has been claimed by urbanisation that significant exploration of explicit strata is tougher than within the open, barren badlands of Wyoming or Alberta. Discoveries of definitely thyreophoran dinosaurs proceed to be made, however quite a lot of these are so fragmentary that they find yourself being taxonomically indeterminate, at finest often proposed to belong to at least one genus or one other. Revisions in taxonomy haven’t simply dwindled Hylaeosaurus to at least one specimen, both; the as soon as widely-represented Polacanthus has additionally been diminished to only a single specimen (Raven et al., 2020).

    Difficulties with British ankylosaur taxonomy have beforehand led lumpers to push for synonymy with the species we do have. For instance, within the Eighties and Nineteen Nineties a debate raged as as to whether Hylaeosaurus and Polacanthus must be thought of a single genus (with the latter changing into a junior synonym, or Hylaeosaurus foxii). Nonetheless, the 2 taxa are separated by over 20 million years… can they actually be a single genus? For perspective, the final frequent ancestor between people and orangutans lived simply 12 million years in the past (Tocheri et al., 2008). And so, British ankylosaurs thunder on, typically with poorly understood specimens which actually require additional research, ideally with newer strategies comparable to Computed Tomography. My Masters thesis concerned utilizing CT information on the Hylaeosaurus holotype to deliver this long-debated cranium materials into the twenty first century with descriptive work not attainable by learning the specimen by hand. However extra on that quickly…

    A painting of the armored dinosaur Hylaeosaurus at the edge of a body of fresh water.

    Fashionable interpretation of Hylaeosaurus armatus taking a drink, towards a backdrop of some typical Creatceous British climate. Paintings by Mark Witton. Used with permission from the creator.

    Concluding remarks

    To sum up: Iguanodon just isn’t the Crystal Palace Iguanodon, Megalosaurus is an emptied wastebasket and Hylaeosaurus is (nonetheless) obscure. That’s good to know, I suppose, however now what? Why is that this essential to know? I feel the person tales of the taxa at Crystal Palace are deeply entwined with the Geological Courtroom itself, and the present resurgence of curiosity in them is the proper time to shine a light-weight on the analysis that has gone into these taxa since. For readability and brevity I’ve chosen to give attention to the precise dinosaurs of the Crystal Palace sculptures, however the identical story can (and may) be checked out for all of the taxa making up this distinctive relic within the historical past of recent science.

    The important thing now’s to show the historic curiosity from a number of individuals ‘within the know’ to the broader palaeontological group, after which the general public. The previous is already taking place; a palaeontology convention that came about final 12 months at London’s Pure Historical past Museum featured a chat on the sculptures by Witton, a poster on new cranium materials discovered within the Hylaeosaurus holotype (a shameless self-plug), and was capped off by a discipline journey to the park itself. Nonetheless, the latter factor – getting this curiosity to stay to a public largely involved with extra urgent worldly issues – is vastly depending on the diploma to which we will hold these sculptures fascinating and above all, secure from hurt.

    Regardless of occasional refurbishments and basic maintenance the place potential, elements of the sculptures regularly break with out the out there funds for speedy repairs. A surprising instance got here through the first COVID-19 lockdown in 2020, when the snout and decrease jaw of the Megalosaurus sculpture was damaged off in an act of obvious vandalism (or carelessness). Whereas persevering with curiosity in these sculptures is definitely bolstered by understanding their historical past, it is usually essential to know the context of the dinosaurs themselves, as they signify not simply the historical past of British palaeontological science, however to an awesome extent the dinosaurs that also lie below our toes in twenty first century Britain.

    Crystal Palace Megalosaurus statue with a damaged lower jaw

    The lacking snout of Megalosaurus, as seen in August 2020. It took a superb few months for a substitute to be made, and the result’s barely completely different in look (color, and some different minor particulars) to the unique work. Photograph by Sam Brilliant.

    References

    Benson, R. B. (2010). An outline of Megalosaurus bucklandii (Dinosauria: Theropoda) from the Bathonian of the UK and the relationships of Center Jurassic theropods. Zoological Journal of the Linnean Society, 158(4), 882-935.

    Buckland, W. (1824). XXI.—Discover on the Megalosaurus or nice Fossil Lizard of Stonesfield. Transactions of the Geological Society of London, 2(2), 390-396.

    Cadbury, D., Mantell, E. G., & Owen, R. (2003). The Dinosaur Hunters: A Story of Sdentific Rivalry and the Discovery of the Prehistoric World. Geoscience Canada, 30(3).

    Naish, D. (2016). The dinosaurs of Crystal Palace: Among the many most correct renditions of prehistoric life ever made. Scientific American.

    Owen, R. (1842). Report on British fossil reptiles. Stories of the British
    Affiliation for the Development of Science, 11:60–204.

    Paul, G. S. (2007). Turning the outdated into the brand new: a separate genus for the gracile iguanodont from the Wealden of England. In Ok. Carpenter (Ed.), Horns and beaks: ceratopsian and ornithopod Dinosaurs (pp. 69–77). Bloomington: Indiana College Press

    Raven, T. J., Barrett, P. M., Pond, S. B., & Maidment, S. C. (2020). Osteology and Taxonomy of British Wealden Supergroup (Berriasian–Aptian) Ankylosaurs (Ornithischia, Ankylosauria). Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology, 40(4), e1826956.

    Tocheri, M. W., Orr, C. M., Jacofsky, M. C., & Marzke, M. W. (2008). The evolutionary historical past of the hominin hand for the reason that final frequent ancestor of Pan and Homo. Journal of Anatomy, 212(4), 544-562.

    Witton, M and Michel, E. (2022). The Artwork and Science of the Crystal Palace Dinosaurs. The Crowood Press Ltd, London. ISBN: 9780719840494



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