''Tengrisaurus'' (meaning "

Tengri Tengri (; Old Uyghur: ; Middle Turkic: ; ; ; ; ; ; ; Proto-Turkic: / ; Mongolian script: , ; , ; , ) is the all-encompassing God of Heaven in the traditional Turkic, Yeniseian, Mongolic, and various other nomadic religious beliefs. So ...

lizard") is a

genus Genus (; : genera ) is a taxonomic rank above species and below family (taxonomy), family as used in the biological classification of extant taxon, living and fossil organisms as well as Virus classification#ICTV classification, viruses. In bino ...

lithostrotia Lithostrotia is a clade of derived titanosaur sauropods that lived during the Early Cretaceous and Late Cretaceous. The group was defined by Upchurch ''et al.'' in 2004 as the most recent common ancestor of ''Malawisaurus'' and ''Saltasaurus'' an ...

sauropod Sauropoda (), whose members are known as sauropods (; from '' sauro-'' + '' -pod'', 'lizard-footed'), is a clade of saurischian ('lizard-hipped') dinosaurs. Sauropods had very long necks, long tails, small heads (relative to the rest of their b ...

, from the

Early Cretaceous The Early Cretaceous (geochronology, geochronological name) or the Lower Cretaceous (chronostratigraphy, chronostratigraphic name) is the earlier or lower of the two major divisions of the Cretaceous. It is usually considered to stretch from 143.1 ...

(

Valanginian In the geologic timescale, the Valanginian is an age or stage of the Early or Lower Cretaceous. It spans between 137.05 ± 0.2 Ma and 132.6 ± 0.2 Ma (million years ago). The Valanginian Stage succeeds the Berriasian Stage of the Lower Cretac ...

Hauterivian The Hauterivian is, in the geologic timescale, an age in the Early Cretaceous Epoch or a stage in the Lower Cretaceous Series. It spans the time between 132.6 ± 2 Ma and 125.77 (million years ago). The Hauterivian is preceded by the Valangi ...

)

Murtoi Formation The Murtoi Formation is a geologic formation in vicinity of Lake Gusinoye in Russia. The Murtoi Fm's sedimentation age (136–130 Ma). It was deposited in the late Valanginian to Early Hauterivian of the Early Cretaceous. Scientists were able ...

Russia Russia, or the Russian Federation, is a country spanning Eastern Europe and North Asia. It is the list of countries and dependencies by area, largest country in the world, and extends across Time in Russia, eleven time zones, sharing Borders ...

. It was described in 2017 by Averianov & Skutschas. The

type species In International_Code_of_Zoological_Nomenclature, zoological nomenclature, a type species (''species typica'') is the species name with which the name of a genus or subgenus is considered to be permanently taxonomically associated, i.e., the spe ...

is ''T. starkovi''. New remains were described in 2021 by Averianov, Sizov & Skutschas.

Description

''Tengrisaurus starkovi'' is based on three caudal vertebrae. The genus is characterized by strongly procoelous anterior and middle caudal vertebrae, with strongly developed pre-epipophyses, highly pneumatic neural spine, and solid bone structure of the centrum.

Classification

Averianov and Efimov (2018) recovered ''Tengrisaurus'' as a

titanosaur Titanosaurs (or titanosaurians; members of the group Titanosauria) were a diverse group of sauropod dinosaurs, including genera from all seven continents. The titanosaurs were the last surviving group of long-necked sauropods, with taxa still thr ...

. They found Lithostrotia to be divided into two main lineages, one containing

Saltasauridae Saltasauridae (named after the Salta region of Argentina where they were first found) is a family of armored herbivorous sauropods from the Upper Cretaceous. They are known from fossils found in South America, Africa, Asia, North America, and Eur ...

, the other containing Lognkosauria, with ''Tengrisaurus'' belonging to the former. The following cladogram follows their analysis.

References

{{Taxonbar, from=Q29785692 Titanosauria Dinosaur genera Valanginian dinosaurs Hauterivian dinosaurs Fossil taxa described in 2017 Dinosaurs of Russia