sauro-, saur-, -saurus, -saurid, -saur, -sauria, -saurian

“Patagonian (big foot) lizard” from Middle Jurassic Patagonia, southeast Argentina. The name comes from Spanish, patagon, “big foot”; a name given the Indians in Argentina. Named by Argentinian paleontologist José Bonaparte in 1979.

“ancestral lizard” from Late Cretaceous Europe. The name comes from Greek patrikos, “paternal, ancestral”. Named by Harry Govier Seeley in 1887.

“Paw Paw lizard” from Early Cretaceous eastern Texas. It was named for the eastern Texas Paw Paw rock Formation, Tarrant County, in which it was discovered in 1989 by twelve-year-old Johnny Maurice. Named by Lee in 1996.

“Pei-Shan (North Mountain) lizard” from Late Cretaceous northwest China. The Chinese name, bei, “north” plus shan, “mountain”. Named by Anders Birger Bohlin in 1953.

“Pekin lizard” from Late Triassic Pekin, North Carolina. Named by Adrian Paul Hunt and Frederic Augustus Lucas (1852-1929) in 1994.

“Lake Pellegrini lizard” from Late Cretaceous Patagonia, Argentina. It was named for Lago (Lake) Pellegrini, Rio Negro Province, northwestern Patagonia, Argentina. This fossil is said to be previously called Epachthosaurus. Named by Leonardo Salgado in 1996.

“Colossal (monstrous) lizard” from Early Cretaceous. It is known from very incomplete skeletons and fossilized skin impressions from the Wealden Formation in England and from a single forelimb bone found in Fervenca, Portugal. Pelorosaurus was named by British paleontologist Gideon A. Matheron Mantell (1790-1852) in 1850.

“Winged lizard” from Late Triassic Europe. Its name is said to come from Greek peteinos, “winged”. Named by Rupert Wild in 1978.

Meaning “gleaming-whole lizard” or “nimble dragon” from Early Cretaceous Sinkiang, northwest China. One source says that the name comes from Greek phaidros, “shining, joyful” plus Latin -olus; however, neither the Greek nor the Latin elements could be found in a large etymological dictionary. This fossil is considered nomen dubium, of “doubtful name”. Named by Chinese paleontologist Zhiming Dong in 1973.

This nomenclature (“light lizard”) is no longer recognized by scientists because they found that it described an animal that was previously given another name which is Chasmosaurus.

“Phu Wiang lizard” from Early Cretaceous Thailand. It was named for Phu Wiang Teema, Amphoe Phu Wiang, Khon Kaen Province, northeastern Thailand. Named by Dr. Jim Martin (Museum of Geology, South Dakota), French paleontologist Erik Buffetaut, and Thai paleontologist Varavudh Suteethorn in 1994.

“Plant (eating) lizards” a taxon proposed to include prosauropods, sauropods, and ornithischians forming a group of herbivores.

“Plant lizard” from Late Triassic Europe. Named by Georg Friedrick von Jaeger in 1828.

“Piatnitzky’s lizard” from Late Jurassic southern Argentina. Named for Alejandro Mateievich Piatnitzky (1879-1959), a Russian-born Argentine geologist, who discovered the Jurassic Cerro Condor fossil locally in Chubut Province, Argentina in 1936. Named by Argentinian paleontologist José Bonaparte in 1979.

A “plank (board) lizard” or “planked (head) lizard” from Late Cretaceous Mongolia and northern China. Formerly called Syrmosaurus. The name is said to come from Greek pinak (pinax), “small board, plank, tablet”. It was found in the Gobi desert in Mongolia, China and named by U. S. paleontologist Charles Whitney Gilmore in 1933.