Outline: a typical early sauropodomorph
Buriolestes
"Buriol's robber"
- Lived
- 237 to 227 million years ago, Late Triassic
- Group
- Early sauropodomorphs
- Found in
- Brazil
- Named by
- Cabreira et al. 2016
Where its fossils were found
The evidence
Today
230 million years ago
Field notes
About Buriolestes
What it was like
Buriolestes was one of the earliest relatives of the giant sauropods, yet it was small and ate meat. Its teeth were sharp, curved and serrated, like a predator's. This suggests that the first members of the sauropod line hunted small animals before their descendants turned to plants.
Its world
It lived in the Late Triassic in what is now Brazil. Its bones come from the Santa Maria Formation, one of the richest sources of early dinosaurs, where it lived alongside the predators Staurikosaurus and Gnathovorax and the plant eater Saturnalia.
How it was found
Cabreira and colleagues named it in 2016. Its name honors the family that owns the land where it was found.
Lived alongside
Found in the same rock formations
Close relatives
Other members of Sauropodomorpha
Sources: WikidataNamed in: S. F. Cabreira, A. W. A. Kellner, and S. Dias-da-Silva, L. R. da Silva, M. Bronzati, J. C. A. Marsola, R. T. Müller, J. S. Bittencourt, B. J. Batista, T. Raugust, R. Carrilho, A. Brodt, M. C. Langer. 2016. A unique Late Triassic dinosauromorph assemblage reveals dinosaur ancestral anatomy and diet. Current Biology 26(22):3090-3095