page_title: Origin of birds
section_title: Huxley, Archaeopteryx and early research
hierarchical_section_title: Origin of birds / Research history / Huxley, Archaeopteryx and early research
caption_attribution_description: Huxley at about 55, scanned &amp; cropped slightly
context_page_description: The scientific question of within which larger group of animals birds evolved has traditionally been called the 'origin of birds'. The present scientific consensus is that birds are a group of maniraptoran theropod dinosaurs that originated during the Mesozoic Era.
  A close relationship between birds and dinosaurs was first proposed in the nineteenth century after the discovery of the primitive bird Archaeopteryx in Germany. Birds and extinct non-avian dinosaurs share many unique skeletal traits. Moreover, fossils of more than thirty species of non-avian dinosaur with preserved feathers have been collected. There are even very small dinosaurs, such as Microraptor and Anchiornis, which have long, vaned arm and leg feathers forming wings. The Jurassic basal avialan Pedopenna also shows these long foot feathers. Paleontologist Lawrence Witmer concluded in 2009 that this evidence is sufficient to demonstrate that avian evolution went through a four-winged stage. Fossil evidence also demonstrates that birds and dinosaurs shared features such as hollow, pneumatized bones, gastroliths in the digestive system, nest-building and brooding behaviors.
context_section_description: Scientific investigation into the origin of birds began shortly after the 1859 publication of Charles Darwin's On the Origin of Species. In 1860, a fossilized feather was discovered in Germany's Late Jurassic Solnhofen limestone. Christian Erich Hermann von Meyer described this feather as Archaeopteryx lithographica the next year. Richard Owen described a nearly complete skeleton in 1863, recognizing it as a bird despite many features reminiscent of reptiles, including clawed forelimbs and a long, bony tail.
  Biologist Thomas Henry Huxley, known as "Darwin's Bulldog" for his tenacious support of the new theory of evolution by means of natural selection, almost immediately seized upon Archaeopteryx as a transitional fossil between birds and reptiles. Starting in 1868, and following earlier suggestions by Karl Gegenbaur, and Edward Drinker Cope, Huxley made detailed comparisons of Archaeopteryx with various prehistoric reptiles and found that it was most similar to dinosaurs like Hypsilophodon and Compsognathus. The discovery in the late 1870s of the iconic "Berlin specimen" of Archaeopteryx, complete with a set of reptilian teeth, provided further evidence. Like Cope, Huxley proposed an evolutionary relationship between birds and dinosaurs. Although Huxley was opposed by the very influential Owen, his conclusions were accepted by many biologists, including Baron Franz Nopcsa, while others, notably Harry Seeley, argued that the similarities were due to convergent evolution.
caption: Thomas Henry Huxley (1825–1895)
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