Ampelosaurus Pronunciation

Fun Facts

• ✓Ampelosaurus is named after the Aude River valley in southern France, a region still famous today for its vineyards, so this dinosaur is literally named after a wine-growing area.
• ✓The fossils of Ampelosaurus date to approximately 71.5 million years ago in the early Maastrichtian stage, meaning it lived less than 6 million years before the asteroid impact that wiped out non-avian dinosaurs.
• ✓Ampelosaurus had osteoderms, bony nodules embedded directly in its skin, which were discovered alongside its bones and confirmed it as one of the armored titanosaurs of Europe.
• ✓Paleontologist Jean Le Loeuff formally named and described Ampelosaurus atacis in 1995, with the species name 'atacis' referring to the Atax, the ancient Roman name for the Aude River.
• ✓Ampelosaurus is one of the best-known sauropods from the island continent that Late Cretaceous Europe had become, when rising seas had split the landmass into a chain of large islands populated by dwarf and unusual dinosaurs.