Dorygnathus ("spear jaw") was a genus of rhamphorhynchid pterosaur that lived in Europe during the Early Jurassic period, when shallow seas flooded much of the continent.

Large curved fangs that "intermeshed" when the jaws closed featured prominently at the front of the snout while smaller, straighter teeth lined the back.

[9] Dorygnathus fossils were often found in the spoil heaps where unusable rock was dumped from slate quarries worked by local farmers.

Due to the excellent preserval of the later found fossils, Dorygnathus has generated much interest by pterosaur researchers, important studies having been dedicated to the species by Felix Plieninger,[11] Gustav von Arthaber,[12] and more recently Kevin Padian.

Wild justified the creation of a new species name by referring to the great size, with an about 50% larger wingspan than with a typical specimen; the short lower leg and the long wing.

The largest known cranium, that of specimen MBR 1920.16 prepared by Bernard Hauff in 1915 and eventually acquired by the Natural History Museum of Berlin, has a length of sixteen centimetres.

In the skull the eye socket forms the largest opening, larger than the fenestra antorbitalis that is clearly separated from the slit-like bony naris.

The lower jaws are thin at the back but deeper toward the front where they fuse into the symphysis ending in a toothless point after which the genus has been named.

From the five carpal bones in the wrist a short but robust pteroid points towards the neck, in the living animal a support for a flight membrane, the propatagium.

The third metatarsal is the longest; the fifth is connected to a toe of which the second phalanx shows a 45° bend and has a blunt and broad end; it perhaps supported a membrane between the legs, a cruropatagium.

However, Ferdinand Broili reported the presence of hairs in specimen BSP 1938 I 49,[16] an indication that Dorygnathus also had pycnofibers or feathers and an elevated metabolism, as is presently assumed for all pterosaurs.

David Unwin in 2003 found that it belonged to the clade Rhamphorhynchinae,[19] but analyses by Alexander Kellner resulted in a much more basal position,[20] below Dimorphodon or Peteinosaurus.

Padian, using a comparative method, in 2008 concluded that Dorygnathus was close to Scaphognathus and Rhamphorhynchus in the phylogenetic tree but also that these species were forming a series of successive off-shoots, meaning that they would not be united in a separate clade.

[23] Very young juveniles of Dorygnathus are unknown, the smallest discovered specimen having a wingspan of sixty centimetres; perhaps they were unable to venture far over open sea.

Padian concluded that Dorygnathus after a relatively fast growth in its early years, faster than any modern reptile of the same size, kept slowly growing after having reached sexual maturity, which would have resulted in exceptionally large individuals with a 1.7 metres (5.6 feet) wingspan.