Uronautes

Uronautes is an extinct genus of rhomaleosaurid plesiosaur from the Late Cretaceous Fox Hills Formation of the United States. The type species is U. cetiformis.Cope, E. D. (1876). On some extinct reptiles and Batrachia from the Judith River and Fox Hills Beds of Montana. Proceedings of the Academy of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia 28:340-359

Discovery and naming The holotype, AMNH 5688, consists of several fossilized vertebra, portions of a few limbs, and ribs.Geological record 1880, pg.280

Uronautes cetiformis was first described by the American paleontologist Edward Drinker Cope in 1876. Welles (1956) described the genus as a "nomen dubium", doubting that the remains were evidence of a true genus.

Etymology The word Uronautes comes from a fusion of the two Greek words Ουρα, meaning "tailed," and Ναυτες, meaning "sailor", or "mariner". The species name of U. cetiformis comes from the Greek word for whale (or any large sea monster), κῆτος and the Latin word forma, which means "shaped", of "formed" meaning "shape".Latin Word Lookup

Description Like many other rhomaleosaurids, Uronautes was a short-necked plesiosaur. The cervical vertebrae are short, with partially attached processes and double-headed ribs.Fieldiana: Geology, April 1903, North American Plesiosaurs, Williston. Pg. 11

Uronautes

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