Apatodon is a dubious genus of dinosaur that may have been a theropod.Essex Institute (2012) "The American Naturalist". Volume 24, Part 1. The type, and only species, A. mirus, was named in 1877 by Othniel Charles Marsh. It was found in the Late Jurassic-aged Morrison Formation of Colorado.Monaco, (1988). A short history of dinosaur collecting in the Garden Park fossil area, Canon City, Colorado. Modern Geology. 23, 465-480.
History When Marsh named Apatodon in 1877, he thought it was a jaw with a tooth from a Mesozoic pig, but it was soon shown that the specimen was an eroded vertebra, from a dinosaur possibly from the Morrison Formation of Garden Park, Colorado.Marsh, O. C. (1877). "Notice of some new vertebrate fossils". American Journal of Arts and Sciences. 14, 249-256. Baur (1890) correctly identified that Marsh (1877) had misidentified the neural spine as the tooth of a pig-like animal.Baur, G. (1890). "A review of the charges against the paleontological department of the U.S. Geological Survey and of the defense made by Prof. O.C. Marsh". American Naturalist 24:288-204.
Apatodon was assigned to Iguanodontoidea by Hay in 1902,O. P. Hay. 1902. Bibliography and Catalogue of the Fossil Vertebrata of North America. Bulletin of the United States Geological Survey 179:1-868 to Ornithischia by von Huene in 1909,Huene, F. v. (1909). Skizze zu einer Systematik und Stammesgeschichte der Dinosaurier. Centralblatt für Mineralogie, Geologie und Paläontologie. 1909, 12-22. to Stegosauridae by von Zittel in 1911,Zittel, K. A. v. (1911). Grundzüge der Paläontologie (Paläozoologie). II. Abteilung. Vertebrata. Druck und Verlag von R. Oldenbourg, München. 1-598. and to Titanosaurinae by Steel in 1970,R. Steel. (1970). Part 14. Saurischia. Handbuch der Paläoherpetologie/Encyclopedia of Paleoherpetology. Gustav Fischer Verlag, Stuttgart 1-87 and also Casanovas et al. in 1987.Casanovas, Santafé, Sanz and Buscalioni, 1987. Arcosaurios (Crocodilia, Dinosauria) del Cretácico superior de la Conca de Tremp (Lleida, España). Estudios Geológicos, Volumen Extraordinario Galve-Tremp. 95-110. (Kuhn in 1939 also listed Apatodon as a sauropod).Kuhn, O. (1939). Saurischia. In Fossilium Catalogus I. Animalia. 87. 124 pp.
The only recovered specimen is not regarded as sufficient to identify a particular species of dinosaur. However, George Olshevsky considered Apatodon to be synonymous with the contemporaneous Allosaurus fragilis.Olshevsky, (1991). "A revision of the parainfraclass Archosauria Cope, 1869, excluding the advanced Crocodylia". Mesozoic Meanderings, 2: 196 pp. The issue is now beyond resolution; however, as the type bone fragment has been lost.
Etymology The name Apatodon is derived from Greek: απατη ("trick", "deceit") and οδους (genitive οδοντος) ("tooth", in reference to its original, incorrect identification).
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