page_title: Anzu wyliei
section_title: History of discovery
hierarchical_section_title: Anzu wyliei / History of discovery
caption_attribution_description: English: Exposures of the Upper Cretaceous Hell Creek and Lance formations in western North America. Localities that have yielded specimens of Anzu wyliei are marked by white stars. Scale bar = 100 km.
context_page_description: Anzu is a genus of caenagnathine dinosaur from the late Cretaceous of North Dakota and South Dakota, US. The type species is Anzu wyliei.
  In 2015, the International Institute for Species Exploration names it as one of the "Top 10 New Species" for new species discovered in 2014.
context_section_description: Several large skeletons from the late Maastrichtian Hell Creek Formation of Montana and South Dakota were initially referred to as "cf. Chirostenotes", though more recent studies concluded that they represent new species.
  In 1998 Fred Nuss of Nuss Fossils discovered the site containing the Holotype CM 7800. The first two partial skeletons of Anzu were discovered in 1998 by Fred Nuss Fossils on a private South Dakota ranch. The two specimens weren't buried together – the skeletons rested about 330 feet apart with the second individual in a rock layer about 11 feet below the first – but, once prepped by the commercial outfit Triebold Paleontology, it was clear that both represented the same dinosaur. Both were mostly disarticulated and appeared to have been transported by a water current. A third referred specimen, fragmentary skeleton MRF 319, studied by Tyler Lyson of the National Museum of Natural History, was discovered by Scott Haire, who spotted the bones at his uncle's ranch at Marmarth, North Dakota. A rear lower jaw fragment, FMNH PR 2296, was also referred.
  These four fossils found at Hell Creek together make up a fairly complete skeleton of Anzu wyliei, comprising about 75 to 80 per cent of the whole skeleton. Three researchers, Emma Schachner of the University of Utah, Matthew Lamanna of the Carnegie Museum of Natural History and Tyler Lyson of the Smithsonian in Washington realized in 2006 that they each had partial skeletons of the same species and began collaborating to study it, assisted by Hans-Dieter Sues, a paleontologist at the National Museum of Natural History of the Smithsonian Institution in Washington. The main fossils are being held at the Carnegie Museum of Natural History in Pittsburgh.
  The genus is notable as the first well-preserved example of a North American oviraptorosaur. According to Sues, "for almost a hundred years, the presence of oviraptorosaurs in North America was only known from a few bits of skeleton, and the details of their appearance and biology remained a mystery. With the discovery of A. wyliei, we finally have the fossil evidence to show what this species looked like and how it is related to other dinosaurs."
  The creature's appearance – "big crests on their skulls, a beak, no teeth, and a very bird-like skeleton" – and its discovery in the Hell Creek Formation led to it being jokingly nicknamed the "chicken from hell". Matthew Lamanna, who devised the species' name, originally wanted to use a Latin or Greek version of "chicken from hell". However, he found that this nickname does not translate well in those languages, so he eventually settled on evoking and using the name of the bird-like daemon Anzu from the mythology of ancient Sumer, which itself roughly translates to "heavenly eagle". The specific name, wyliei, honors Wylie J. Tuttle, the grandson of one of the museum's donors, Lee B. Foster.
caption: Map of locations yielding Anzu specimens (stars)
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