In 1863, Owen reported on the first specimen of an unusual Jurassic fossil from Germany, the famous bird Archaeopteryx lithographica . Perhaps Owen's most famous taxonomic act resulted from his examination of reptile-like fossil bones that were being found in southern England by naturalists such as Gideon Mantell. In 1842, he named this taxon the Dinosauria . The uniqueness of human brains, Owen thought, showed that humans could not possibly have evolved from apes. This tarnished Owen's scientific standing towards the end of his life.
Nothing is to be depended on but the great hippopotamus test.
If you have a hippopotamus major in your brain, you are no ape, though you had four hands, no feet, and were more apish than the apes of all aperies. I am not sure that anyone but the historian of anatomical science is ever likely to recur to them. . . . But Owen has fared better than the fate Huxley predicted. His taxonomic work included a number of important discoveries, and his role in founding the British Museum of Natural History left a lasting legacy to scientists and lay persons alike. His concept of homology, reinterpreted in evolutionary terms, remains an extremely important and still-contentious biological concept.