PALEONTOLOGY
New study finds dinosaur fossils did not inspire the mythological griffin
UNIVERSITY OF PORTSMOUTH
IMAGE:
PAINTING OF A GRIFFIN, A LION-RAPTOR CHIMAERA, ALONGSIDE THE FOSSILS OF PROTOCERATOPS, A HORNED DINOSAUR. THE LATTER ARE SAID TO HAVE INFORMED THE LORE AND APPEARANCE OF THE FORMER, BUT OUR STUDY SUGGESTS THAT THERE IS NO COMPELLING CONNECTION BETWEEN DINOSAURS AND GRIFFINS.
view moreCREDIT: DR MARK WITTON
A popular and widely-promoted claim that dinosaur fossils inspired the legend of the griffin, the mythological creature with a raptorial bird head and wings on a lion body, has been challenged in a new study.
The specific link between dinosaur fossils and griffin mythology was proposed over 30 years ago in a series of papers and books written by folklorist Adrienne Mayor. These started with the 1989 Cryptozoology paper entitled ‘Paleocryptozoology: a call for collaboration between classicists and cryptozoologists’, and was cemented in the seminal 2000 book ‘The First Fossil Hunters. The idea became a staple of books, documentaries and museum exhibits.
It suggests that an early horned dinosaur of Mongolia and China, Protoceratops, was discovered by ancient nomads prospecting for gold in Central Asia. Tales of Protoceratops bones then travelled southwest on trade routes to inspire, or at least influence, stories and art of the griffin.
Griffins are some of the oldest mythological creatures, first appearing in Egyptian and Middle Eastern art during the 4th millennium BC, before becoming popular in ancient Greece during the 8th century BC.
Protoceratops was a small (around 2 metres long) dinosaur that lived in Mongolia and northern China during the Cretaceous period (75-71 million years ago). They belong to the horned dinosaur group, making it a relative of Triceratops, although they actually lack facial horns. Like griffins, Protoceratops stood on four legs, had beaks, and had frill-like extensions of their skulls that, it’s been argued, could be interpreted as wings.
In the first detailed assessment of the claims, study authors Dr Mark Witton and Richard Hing, palaeontologists at the University of Portsmouth, re-evaluated historical fossil records, the distribution and nature of Protoceratops fossils, and classical sources linking the griffin with the Protoceratops, consulting with historians and archeologists to fully understand the conventional, non-fossil based view of griffin origins. Ultimately, they found that none of the arguments withstood scrutiny.
Ideas that Protoceratops would be discovered by nomads prospecting for gold, for instance, are unlikely when Protoceratops fossils occur hundreds of kilometres away from ancient gold sites. In the century since Protoceratops was discovered, no gold has been reported alongside them. It also seems doubtful that nomads would have seen much of Protoceratops skeletons, even if they prospected for gold where their fossils occur.
“There is an assumption that dinosaur skeletons are discovered half-exposed, lying around almost like the remains of recently-deceased animals,” said Dr Witton. “But generally speaking, just a fraction of an eroding dinosaur skeleton will be visible to the naked eye, unnoticed to all except for sharp-eyed fossil hunters.
“That’s almost certainly how ancient peoples wandering around Mongolia encountered Protoceratops. If they wanted to see more, as they’d need to if they were forming myths about these animals, they’d have to extract the fossil from the surrounding rock. That is no small task, even with modern tools, glues, protective wrapping and preparatory techniques. It seems more probable that Protoceratops remains, by and large, went unnoticed — if the gold prospectors were even there to see them.”
Similarly, the geographic spread of griffin art through history does not align with the scenario of griffin lore beginning with Central Asian fossils and then spreading west. There are also no unambiguous references to Protoceratops fossils in ancient literature.
Protoceratops is only griffin-like in being a four-limbed animal with a beak. There are no details in griffin art suggesting that their fossils were referenced but, conversely, many griffins were clearly composed from features of living cats and birds.
Dr Witton added: “Everything about griffin origins is consistent with their traditional interpretation as imaginary beasts, just as their appearance is entirely explained by them being chimaras of big cats and raptorial birds. Invoking a role for dinosaurs in griffin lore, especially species from distant lands like Protoceratops, not only introduces unnecessary complexity and inconsistencies to their origins, but also relies on interpretations and proposals that don’t withstand scrutiny.”
The authors are keen to stress that there is excellent evidence of fossils being culturally important throughout human history, and innumerable instances of fossils inspiring folklore around the world, referred to as ‘geomyths’.
Richard Hing said: “It is important to distinguish between fossil folklore with a factual basis — that is, connections between fossils and myth evidenced by archaeological discoveries or compelling references in literature and artwork — and speculated connections based on intuition.
“There is nothing inherently wrong with the idea that ancient peoples found dinosaur bones and incorporated them into their mythology, but we need to root such proposals in realities of history, geography and palaeontology. Otherwise, they are just speculation.”
Dr Witton added: “Not all mythological creatures demand explanations through fossils. Some of the most popular geomyths — Protoceratops and griffins, fossil elephants and cyclopes, and dragons and dinosaurs — have no evidential basis and are entirely speculative. We promote these stories because they’re exciting and seem intuitively plausible, but doing so ignores our growing knowledge of fossil geomyths grounded in fact and evidence. These are just as interesting as their conjectural counterparts, and probably deserve more attention than entirely speculated geomythological scenarios.”
The study is published in Interdisciplinary Science Reviews.
Comparisons between the skeleton of Protoceratops and ancient griffin art. The griffins are all very obviously based on big cats, from their musculature and long, flexible tails to the manes (indicated by coiled “hair” on the neck), and birds, and differ from Protoceratops in virtually all measures of proportion and form. Image compiled from illustrations in Witton and Hing (2024).
CREDIT
Dr Mark Witton
JOURNAL
Interdisciplinary Science Reviews
METHOD OF RESEARCH
Literature review
SUBJECT OF RESEARCH
Not applicable
ARTICLE TITLE
‘Did the horned dinosaur Protoceratops inspire the griffin?’
ARTICLE PUBLICATION DATE
21-Jun-2024
Scientists reveal new species of horned
dinosaur that roamed northern U.S.
An artist's impression of Lokiceratops as it would have appeared in swamps of northern Montana 78 million years ago, complete with two Probrachylophosaurus moving past in the background.
June 20 (UPI) -- American scientists announced Thursday the discovery of a new species of horned dinosaur which at 11,000 pounds and 22 feet long is the largest centrosaurine ever found in North America and roamed the swamps of what is now the badlands of Montana in the late Cretaceous period 78 million years ago.
The new dinosaur was identified and subsequently christened Lokiceratops rangiformis by Colorado State University affiliate faculty member Joseph Sertich and Utah University Professor Mark Loewen due to an ostentatious set of curving blade-like horns on the rear of its "frill" and an asymmetrical horn that bear comparison with the antlers of caribou, Colorado State University said in a news release.
The find, detailed in a peer-reviewed study published in the scientific journal PeerJ, is named for Loki, a mythological human-like Norse god with horns and its Triceratops descendant and translates, approximately, to "Loki's horned face that looks like a caribou."
"The dinosaur now has a permanent home in Denmark, so we went with a Norse god, and in the end, doesn't it just really look like Loki with the curving blades?" said Loewen, co-author and paleontologist at the Natural History Museum of Utah in Salt Lake City.
Speaking as a replica was put on display to the public at the museum, co-author and Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute paleontologist Sertich said: "It's one of those stories with a happy ending, where it didn't go to somebody's mansion. It ended up in a museum, where it will be preserved forever so people can study it and enjoy visiting it."
The original is on permanent display at the Museum of Evolution on the Danish island of Lolland, south of Copenhagen, Denmark, to which both men are scientific consultants.
Sertich and Loewen reconstructed the head and frill/horns array from dinner plate-sized and smaller-sized bone fragments found in 2019 in northern Montana, just south of the Canadian border
Once they had pieced the skull together they realized they had a new dinosaur species, the largest ever North American find from a group of horned dinosaurs called centrosaurines.
It has the largest frill horns ever seen on a horned dinosaur but does not have the nose horn common to most centrosaurines.
"This new dinosaur pushes the envelope on bizarre ceratopsian headgear, sporting the largest frill horns ever seen in a ceratopsian," said Sertich.
"These skull ornaments are one of the keys to unlocking horned dinosaur diversity and demonstrate that evolutionary selection for showy displays contributed to the dizzying richness of Cretaceous ecosystems."
However, as formidable as its appearance makes it seem Lokicertatops' elaborate headgear had everything to do with showing off and nothing to do with predation as it was, like Triceraptops, a harmless plant eater.
Comparing dinosaur horns to feathers on birds, Sertich noted how they have evolved distinct colors and patterns to differentiate the species to which they belong from other similar bird species.
"We think that the horns on these dinosaurs were analogous to what birds are doing with displays. They're using them either for mate selection or species recognition," he said.
Lokiceratops was excavated from the same rock layer as four other dinosaur species suggesting all five were alive 78 million years ago in the swamps and coastal plains along the eastern shore of a then-sea down the middle of the continent, three of which were closely related but only found in that region.
"It's unheard-of diversity to find five living together, similar to what you would see on the plains of East Africa today with different horned ungulates," Sertich said.
The discovery of Loki is evidence these three species appeared within a relatively short period but were geographically limited to this distinct locale -- a process often seen among birds on islands or otherwise isolated habitats -- unlike the wide range of mammals, such as elk, now found all across the western United States.
However, these regional differences had been ironed out by the end of the Cretaceous era, leaving just two species of horned dinosaurs from Canada to Mexico which Sertich postulated could have been due to regional differences in climatic conditions being replaced with a homogenous climate.
The end of the Cretaceous period spelled the end for the horned dinosaurs, and indeed the dinosaur era itself, with the Chicxulub impactor when a 7-mile-wide asteroid slammed into the north coast of what is now Mexico's Yucatan Peninsula at 45,000 miles-per-hour.
The study offers both the most comprehensive genealogy of horned dinosaurs and demonstrates that there was far greater diversity among the dinosaurs than previously understood.
"Lokiceratops helps us understand that we only are scratching the surface when it comes to the diversity and relationships within the family tree of horned dinosaurs," said Loewen.
Newly discovered dinosaur boasts big, blade-like horns
Ancient marvel Lokiceratops’ ornate horns point to evolutionary insights
IMAGE:
RECONSTRUCTION OF LOKICERATOPS IN THE 78-MILLION-YEAR-OLD SWAMPS OF NORTHERN MONTANA, AS TWO PROBRACHYLOPHOSAURUS MOVE PAST IN THE BACKGROUND.
ARTWORK BY FABRIZIO LAVEZZI © EVOLUTIONSMUSEET, KNUTHENBORG
view moreCREDIT: FABRIZIO LAVEZZI
What do you get when you cross Norse mythology with a 78-million-year-old ancestor to the Triceratops? Answer: Lokiceratops rangiformis, a plant-eating dinosaur with a very fancy set of horns.
The new dinosaur was identified and named by Colorado State University affiliate faculty member Joseph Sertich and University of Utah Professor Mark Loewen. The dinosaur’s name, announced today in the scientific journal PeerJ, translates roughly to “Loki’s horned face that looks like a caribou.”
Loewen and Sertich, co-lead authors of the PeerJ study, dubbed the new species Lokiceratops (lo-Kee-sare-a-tops) rangiformis (ran-ɡi-FOHR-mees) because of the unusual, curving blade-like horns on the back of its frill – the shield of bone at the back of the skull – and the asymmetrical horns at the peak of the frill, reminiscent of caribou antlers.
“The dinosaur now has a permanent home in Denmark, so we went with a Norse god, and in the end, doesn't it just really look like Loki with the curving blades?” Loewen said, referring to the trickster god’s weapon of choice.
Loewen, a paleontologist at the Natural History Museum of Utah, and Sertich, a paleontologist with the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute, are both scientific consultants for the Museum of Evolution in Denmark, Lokiceratops’ new home.
"It's one of those stories with a happy ending, where it didn't go to somebody's mansion," Sertich said. “It ended up in a museum, where it will be preserved forever so people can study it and enjoy visiting it.”
New dinosaur discovery
Lokiceratops was discovered in 2019 in the badlands of northern Montana, two miles (3.2 kilometers) south of the U.S.-Canada border. Sertich and Loewen helped reconstruct the dinosaur from fragments the size of dinner plates and smaller. Once they had pieced the skull together, they realized the specimen was a new type of dinosaur.
Estimated to be 22 feet (6.7 meters) long and weigh 11,000 pounds (5 metric tonnes), Lokiceratops is the largest dinosaur from the group of horned dinosaurs called centrosaurines ever found in North America. It has the largest frill horns ever seen on a horned dinosaur and lacks the nose horn that is characteristic among its kin.
“This new dinosaur pushes the envelope on bizarre ceratopsian headgear, sporting the largest frill horns ever seen in a ceratopsian,” Sertich said in a press release announcing the dinosaur’s unveiling at the Natural History Museum of Utah, where a replica is displayed. “These skull ornaments are one of the keys to unlocking horned dinosaur diversity and demonstrate that evolutionary selection for showy displays contributed to the dizzying richness of Cretaceous ecosystems.”
Sertich likened dinosaur horns to feathers on birds. Birds use feather colors and patterns to differentiate their own species among other, similar species of birds.
"We think that the horns on these dinosaurs were analogous to what birds are doing with displays,” Sertich said. “They're using them either for mate selection or species recognition.”
What Loki’s horns tell us about dinosaurs
Lokiceratops was excavated from the same rock layer as four other dinosaur species, indicating that five different dinosaurs lived side by side 78 million years ago in the swamps and coastal plains along the eastern shore of Laramidia, the western landmass of North America created when a seaway divided the continent. Three of these species were closely related but not found outside the region.
"It's unheard-of diversity to find five living together, similar to what you would see on the plains of East Africa today with different horned ungulates,” Sertich said.
Unlike the broad range of large wild mammals that roam the U.S. West today, such as elk, these ancient animals were geographically limited, he added. Loki’s discovery provides evidence that these species evolved rapidly within a small area, a process sometimes seen in birds.
By the time Triceratops came onto the scene 12 million years later, regional differences had been homogenized into just two species of horned dinosaurs from Canada to Mexico – possibly in response to a more homogenous climate, Sertich said.
The study shows that dinosaur diversity has been underestimated and presents the most complete family tree of horned dinosaurs to date.
"Lokiceratops helps us understand that we only are scratching the surface when it comes to the diversity and relationships within the family tree of horned dinosaurs," Loewen said.
The skull of Lokiceratops rangiformis, mounted and on exhibit at the Museum of Evolution in Maribo, Denmark.
Credit: Museum of Evolution
JOURNAL
PeerJ
ARTICLE TITLE
Lokiceratops rangiformis gen. et sp. nov. (Ceratopsidae: Centrosaurinae) from the Campanian Judith River Formation of Montana reveals rapid regional radiations and extreme endemism within centrosaurine dinosaurs
ARTICLE PUBLICATION DATE
20-Jun-2024
New, giant horned dinosaur discovered in the ancient swamps of Montana
Lokiceratops rangiformis is among the largest and most ornate horned dinosaur ever found, with two huge blade-like horns on the back of its frill.
UNIVERSITY OF UTAH
IMAGE:
PORTRAIT RECONSTRUCTIONS OF ALL FOUR CENTROSAURINE DINOSAURS THAT LIVED TOGETHER IN THE KENNEDY COULEE ASSEMBLAGE OF NORTHERN MONTANA AND SOUTHERN ALBERTA.
view moreCREDIT: FABRIZIO LAVEZZI © EVOLUTIONSMUSEET, KNUTHENBORG
A remarkable, new species of horned, plant-eating dinosaur is being unveiled at the Natural History Museum of Utah. The dinosaur, excavated from the badlands of northern Montana just a few miles from the USA-Canada border, is among the largest and most ornate ever found, with two huge blade-like horns on the back of its frill. The distinctive horn pattern inspired its name, Lokiceratops rangiformis, meaning “Loki’s horned face that looks like a caribou.” The new species was announced today in the scientific journal PeerJ.
More than 78 million years ago, Lokiceratops inhabited the swamps and floodplains along the eastern shore of Laramidia. This island continent represents what is now the western part of North America created when a great seaway divided the continent around 100 million years ago. Mountain building and dramatic changes in climate and sea level have since altered the hothouse world of Laramidia where Lokiceratops and other dinosaurs thrived. The behemoth is a member of the horned dinosaurs called ceratopsids, a group that evolved around 92 million years ago during the Late Cretaceous, diversified into a myriad of fantastically ornamented species, and survived until the end of the time of dinosaurs. Lokiceratops (lo-Kee-sare-a-tops) rangiformis (ran-ɡi-FOHR-mees) possesses several unique features, among them are the absence of a nose horn, huge, curving blade-like horns on the back of the frill—the largest ever found on a horned dinosaur—and a distinct, asymmetric spike in the middle of the frill.
Lokiceratops rangiformis appeared at least 12 million years earlier than its famous cousin Triceratops and was the largest horned dinosaur of its time. The name Lokiceratops translates as “Loki’s horned face” honoring the blade-wielding Norse god Loki. The second name, rangiformis, refers to the differing horn lengths on each side of the frill, similar to the asymmetric antlers of caribou and reindeer.
“This new dinosaur pushes the envelope on bizarre ceratopsian headgear, sporting the largest frill horns ever seen in a ceratopsian,” said Joseph Sertich, a paleontologist with the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute and Colorado State University, and co-leader of the study. “These skull ornaments are one of the keys to unlocking horned dinosaur diversity and demonstrate that evolutionary selection for showy displays contributed to the dizzying richness of Cretaceous ecosystems.”
Lokiceratops rangiformis is the fourth centrosaurine, and fifth horned dinosaur overall, identified from this single assemblage. While ceratopsian ancestors were widespread across the northern hemisphere throughout the Cretaceous period, their isolation on Laramidia led to the evolution of huge body sizes, and most characteristically, distinctive patterns of horns above their eyes and noses, on their cheeks and along the edges of their elongated head frills. Fossils recovered from this region suggest horned dinosaurs were living and evolving in a small geographic area—a high level of endemism that implies dinosaur diversity is underestimated.
“Previously, paleontologists thought a maximum of two species of horned dinosaurs could coexist at the same place and time. Incredibly, we have identified five living together at the same time,” said co-lead author Mark Loewen, paleontologist at the Natural History Museum of Utah and professor in the Department of Geology & Geophysics at the University of Utah. “The skull of Lokiceratops rangiformis is dramatically different from the other four animals it lived alongside.”
Horned dinosaurs were more diverse than previously thought, and some groups had relatively small distributions across the island landmass of Laramidia during the Late Cretaceous
Scientists have argued about the patterns of evolution within the group of horned dinosaurs over the years. “We now recognize over 30 species of centrosaurines within the greater group of horned dinosaurs, with more like Lokiceratopsbeing described every year,” said co-author Andrew Farke from the Raymond M. Alf Museum of Paleontology. This study shows that centrosaurine ceratopsid species and clades were confined to small geographic areas. “The endemism present in centrosaurines is greater than in any other group of dinosaurs,” said undergraduate University of Utah student and co-author Savhannah Carpenter. “Rapid evolution may have led to the 100- to 200-thousand-year turnover of individual species of these horned dinosaurs,” said Loewen. This rapid evolution is most consistent with sexual selection acting upon these animals. “Sexual selection acting on the genes responsible for the horns of the frill would produce modifications to cis-regulatory elements that would express differences in the size and shape of individual frill horns producing the variations in patterns we see in these animals,” said coauthor Jingmai O’Connor of the Field Museum in Chicago.
Reconstruction of Lokiceratops surprised by a crocodilian in the 78-million-year-old swamps of northern Montana, USA.
CREDIT
©Andrey Atuchin for the Museum of Evolution in Maribo, Denmark.
METHOD OF RESEARCH
Observational study
SUBJECT OF RESEARCH
Not applicable
ARTICLE TITLE
Lokiceratops rangiformis gen. et sp. nov. (Ceratopsidae: Centrosaurinae) from the Campanian Judith River Formation of Montana reveals rapid regional radiations and extreme endemism within centrosaurine dinosaurs
ARTICLE PUBLICATION DATE
20-Jun-2024
COI STATEMENT
Andrew A. Farke is an Academic Editor for PeerJ. Brock A. Sisson is owner of Fossilogic LLC, which produces cast replicas of Lokiceratops elements..
