1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Archaeopteryx
ARCHAEOPTERYX. The name of Archaeopteryx lithographica was based by Hermann von Meyer upon a feather (Gr. πτέρυξ, wing) found in 1861 in the lithographic slate quarries of Solenhofen in Bavaria, the geological horizon being that of the Kimmeridge clay of the Upper Oolite or Jurassic system. In the same year and at the same place was discovered the specimen (figs. 1 and 3) now in the British Museum, named by Andreas Wagner Griphosaurus. Sir R. Owen has described it as A. macroura. Stimulated by the high price paid by the British Museum, the quarry owners diligently searched, and in 1872 another, much finer, preserved specimen was found. This was bought by K. W. v. Siemens, who presented it to the Berlin Museum. The late W. Dames has written an excellent monograph on it.
Fig. 1.—The British Museum specimen.
Fig. 2.—The specimen in the Museum für Naturkunde, Berlin.
After a photograph taken from a cast.
Archaeopteryx was a bird, without any doubt, but still with so many low, essentially reptilian characters that it forms a link between these two classes. About the size of a rook, its most obvious peculiarity is the long reptilian tail, composed of 20 vertebrae and not ending in a pygostyle. The last dozen vertebrae each carry a pair of well-developed typical quills. Upon these features of the tail E. Haeckel established the subclass Saururae, containing solely Archaeopteryx, in opposition to the Ornithurae, comprising all the other birds. Herein he has been followed by many zoologists. However, the fact that various recent birds possess the same kind of caudal skeleton, likewise without a pygostyle, although reduced to at least 13 vertebrae, shows that the two terms do not express a fundamental difference.
Fig. 3.—Tail of British Museum specimen.
The importance of Archaeopteryx justifies the following descriptive detail. Vertebral column composed of about 50 vertebrae, viz. 10-11 cervical, 12-11 thoracic, 2 lumbar, 5-6 sacral, and 20 or 21 caudal, with a total caudal length of the Berlin specimen of 7 in. The cervical and thoracic vertebrae seem to be biconcave; the cervical ribs are much reduced and were apparently still movable; the thoracic ribs are devoid of uncinate processes. Paired abdominal ribs are doubtful. Scarcely anything is known of the sternum, and little of the shoulder-girdle, except the very stout furcula; scapula typically bird-like. Humerus about 212 in. long, with a strong crista lateralis, which indicates a strongly developed great pectoral muscle and hence, by inference, the presence of a keel to the sternum. Radius and ulna typically avine, 2·1 in. in length. Carpus with two separate bones. The hand skeleton consists of 3 completely separate metacarpals, each carrying a complete, likewise free, finger; the shortened thumb with 2, the index with 3, the third with 4 phalanges; each finger with a curved claw. The whole wing is consequently, although essentially avine, still reptilian in the unfused state of the metacarpals and the numbers of the phalanges. The pelvis is imperfectly known. The preacetabular portion of the ilium is shorter than the posterior half. The hind-limb is typically avine, with intertarsal joint, distally reduced fibula, and the three elongated metatarsals which show already considerable anchylosis; reduction of the toes to four, with 2, 3, 4 and 5 phalanges; the hallux is separate, and as usual in recent birds posterior in position. Skull bird-like, except that the short bill cannot have been enclosed in a horny rhamphotheca, since the upper jaw shows a row of 13, the lower jaw 3 conical teeth, all implanted in distinct sockets.
The remiges and rectrices indicate perfect feathers, with shaft and complete vanes which were so neatly finished that they must have possessed typical radii and hooklets. Some of the quills measure fully 5 in. in length. Six or seven remiges were attached to the hand, ten to the ulna.
It is idle to speculate on the habits of this earliest of known birds. That it could fly is certain, and the feet show it to have been well adapted to arboreal life. The clawed slender fingers did not make Archaeopteryx any more quadrupedal or bat-like in its habits than is a kestrel hawk, with its equally large, or even larger thumb-claw.
Bibliography.—H. v. Meyer, Neues Jahrb. f. Mineralog. (1861), p. 679; Sir R. Owen, “On the Archaeopteryx von Meyer...” Phil. Trans., 1863, pp. 33-47, pls. i.-iv.; T. H. Huxley, “Remarks on the Skeleton of the Archaeopteryx and on the relations of the bird to the reptile,” Geol. Mag. i., 1864, pp. 55-57; C. Vogt, “L’Archaeopteryx macrura,” Revue scient. de la France et de l’étranger, 1879, pp. 241-248; W. Dames, “Über Archaeopteryx,” Palaeontol. Abhandl. ii. (Berlin, 1884); Idem, “Über Brustbein Schulter- und Beckengürtel der Archaeopteryx,” Math. naturw. Mitth. Berlin. vii. (1897), pp. 476-492. (H. F. G.)