Hatzegopteryx thambema ver 2

Class: Sauropsida

Order: Pterosauria

Suborder: Pterodactyloidea

Family: Azhdarchidae

Genus: Hatzegopteryx Buffetaut, Grigorescu & Csiki, 2002

Species H. thambema Buffetaut, Grigorescu & Csiki, 2002 (type)

Hatzegopteryx apparently had a robust skull broadened in the rear, and a massive jaw. Its lower jaw featured a unique groove in its point of articulation, also seen in some other pterosaurs, that would have allowed the animal to achieve a very wide gape. Many of the fossilized bones of Hatzegopteryx closely resemble those of the closely related Quetzalcoatlus, though in Hatzegopteryx the skull was much more heavily built, and had a markedly different jaw articulation similar to that seen in Pteranodon. Based on comparisons with other pterosaurs, Nyctosaurus and Anhanguera, Buffetaut and colleagues when initially describing the specimens estimated that the skull of Hatzegopteryx was probably almost three meter (ten feet) in length, which would have made it larger than that of the largest Quetzalcoatlus species and among the largest skulls of any known non-marine animals.[1]

The skull of Hatzegopteryx was also unique in its heavy, robust construction. Most pterosaur skulls are made up of very lightweight plates and struts. In Hatzegopteryx, the skull bones are stout and robust, with large-ridged muscle insertion areas. In their 2002 description, Buffetaut and colleagues suggested that in order to fly, the skull weight of this pterosaur must have been reduced in some unconventional way (while they allowed that it could have been flightless, they found this unlikely due to the similarity of its wing bones to flying pterosaurs). The authors theorized that the necessary weight reduction was accomplished by the internal structure of the skull bones, which were full of small pits and hollows (alveoli) up to 10 mm long, separated by a matrix of incredibly thin bony struts (trabeculae), a feature also found in some parts of Hatzegopteryx wing bones. The authors pointed out that this unusual construction, which differed significantly from the irregular internal structure of other pterosaur skulls, resembles the structure of expanded polystyrene, the substance used to make Styrofoam. They noted that this would allow a sturdy, stress-resistant construction while remaining lightweight, and would have allowed the huge-headed animal to fly.
The authors estimated the size of Hatzegopteryx by comparing the humerus fragment, 236 millimetres long, with that of Quetzalcoatlus, of which specimen TMM 41450-3 has a 544 millimetres long humerus. Observing that the Hatzegopteryx fragment presented less than half of the original bone, they established that it could possibly have been "slightly longer" than that of Quetzalcoatlus. They noted that the wing span of the latter had in 1981 been estimated at eleven to twelve metres, while earlier estimates has strongly exceeded this at fifteen to twenty metres. From this they concluded that an estimate of a twelve meter wing span for Hatzegopteryx was conservative "if its humerus was indeed somewhat longer than that of Q. northropi". In 2003 they moderated the estimates to a close to twelve metres wing span and an over 2.5 metres skull length.

after John Sibbick's Quetzalcoatlus nothropi
gouache on canvas board, 40x60cm, 2009.