Yaverlandia


Yaverlandia is a genus of maniraptoran dinosaur. Known from a partial fossil skull found in Lower Cretaceous strata of the Wessex Formation on the Isle of Wight, it was described as the earliest known member of the pachycephalosaurid family, but research by Darren Naish shows it to have actually been a theropod, seemingly a maniraptoran. The rumour mill is suggesting hat Yaverlandia may be a troodontid. Yaverlandia was named from where it was found, Yaverland Point/ Yaverland Battery.
It was about 3 ft in length and 1 ft in height. The type species is Yaverlandia bitholus.

Discovery and naming

The holotype skull of Y. bitholus was discovered in 1930, in England. It was referred to as an iguanodontid of the genus Vectisaurus in 1936. But when Steel followed Hulke in listing Vectisaurus as an iguanodontid; in 1971, Peter Malcolm Galton named the fossil as Yaverlandia, which he described as a pachycephalosaurid since the skull of Yaverlandia was different to that of Vectisaurus. Sullivan, Sereno Naish, Sullivan and Naish all re-classified Yaverlandia as a maniraptoran.