page_title: Ampelosaurus
section_title: Distinguishing anatomical features
hierarchical_section_title: Ampelosaurus / Description / Distinguishing anatomical features
caption_attribution_description: Ampelosaurus osteoderm, on display at the Musée des dinosaures, Esperaza, France
context_page_description: Ampelosaurus is a titanosaurian sauropod dinosaur hailing from the Late Cretaceous Period of what is now France. Its type species is A. atacis, named by Le Loeuff in 1995. A possible unnamed species has given Ampelosaurus an age reaching to the latest Cretaceous, from about 70 to 66 million years ago.
  Like most sauropods, it would have had a long neck and tail but it also carried armor in the form of osteoderms. Over 500 bones have been assigned to Ampelosaurus and all but the braincase has been assigned to A. atacis. They are assigned to the same species because all the differences in the limb proportions have been linked to individual variation. A. atacis is known from a few, well-preserved teeth and some cranial material. A right scapula was discovered associated with a coracoid. The blade of the scapula, contrary to most titanosaurs, is triangular. The blade narrows at one end instead of showing an expansion like most other genera. A. atacis is also known from a pubis about 75 centimetres long and an ilium. Aside from that, it is known from a partial forelimb, and many femora.
  Titanosaurians were a flourishing group of sauropod dinosaurs during Cretaceous times.
context_section_description: This set of characters was identified by Le Loeuff in his description of Ampelosaurus to distinguish it from all other genera: teeth that weakly spatulate; a laterally widening distal extremity of neural spines on the dorsal vertebrae; neural arch of the dorsal vertebrae inclining strongly towards the rear; the lack of a distal expansion on the scapular blade; the presence of a light, ventral crest on top of the scapula; the presence of plate, bulb, and spine shaped osteoderms; and, in 2005, Le Loeuff added that the constriction of the neural spine on the dorsal and cervical vertebrae was also probably a characteristic of Ampelosaurus.
caption: Osteoderm
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