In 1895 Richard Lydekker named a new species of Bothriospondylus, B. madagascariensis based on fossils found before 1894 by Joseph Thomas Last in the Majunga Basin in layers of the Bathonian, the Isalo III Formation.

[1] Because there was no real connection with this English form, in 1986 José Fernando Bonaparte named a separate genus.

[4] Age determination studies performed using growth ring counts suggest that this sauropod took 31–45 years to reach sexual maturity[5] and was relatively fast-growing given the presence of a large amount of fibrolamellar bone.

[7] However, recent phylogenetic analyses have shown it to be a basal eusauropod, not closely related to brachiosaurids at all.

[10] This position is supported by the presence of two autapomorphies common on both Lapparentosaurus and Cetiosaurus: a pyramid-shaped neural spine from the anterior dorsal vertebrae with tapering in shape or not flaring distally and loss of the spinodiapophyseal lamina on the dorsal vertebrae.