Sir Thomas Pennyson gave the fragment to Robert Plot, Professor of Chemistry at the University of Oxford and first curator of the Ashmolean Museum, who published a description and illustration in his Natural History of Oxfordshire in 1676.

[11] In 1970, paleontologist Lambert Beverly Halstead pointed out that the similarity of Scrotum humanum to a modern species name, a so-called Linnaean "binomen" that has two parts, was not a coincidence.

[12] In 1993, after the death of Halstead, his friend William A.S. Sarjeant submitted a petition to the International Commission on Zoological Nomenclature to formally suppress the name Scrotum in favour of Megalosaurus.

However, the Executive Secretary of the ICZN at the time, Philip K. Tubbs, did not consider the petition to be admissible, concluding that the term "Scrotum humanum", published merely as a label for an illustration, did not constitute the valid creation of a new name, and stated that there was no evidence it was ever intended as such.

[17] Buckland, urged on by an impatient Cuvier, continued to work on the subject during 1823, letting his later wife Mary Morland provide drawings of the bones, that were to be the basis of illustrating lithographies.

Generally, in his mind Megalosaurus resembled a gigantic lizard, but Buckland already understood from the form of the thigh bone head that the legs were not so much sprawling as held rather upright.

Even taking into account the effects of allometry, heavier animals having relatively stouter bones, Buckland was forced in the printed version of his lecture to estimate the maximum length of Megalosaurus at 60 to 70 feet.

[18] The existence of Megalosaurus posed some problems for Christian orthodoxy, which typically held that suffering and death had only come into the world through Original Sin, which seemed irreconcilable with the presence of a gigantic devouring reptile during a pre-Adamitic phase of history.

[24] Around 1840, it became fashionable in England to espouse the concept of the transmutation of species as part of a general progressive development through time, as expressed in the work of Robert Chambers.

In reaction, on 2 August 1841 Richard Owen during a lecture to the British Association for the Advancement of Science claimed that certain prehistoric reptilian groups had already attained the organisational level of present mammals, implying there had been no progress.

[25] In 1852, Benjamin Waterhouse Hawkins was commissioned to build a life-sized concrete model of Megalosaurus for the exhibition of prehistoric animals at the Crystal Palace Park in Sydenham, where it remains to this day.

The sculpture in Crystal Palace Park shows a conspicuous hump on the shoulders and it has been suggested this was inspired by a set of high vertebral spines acquired by Owen in the early 1850s.

Shortly afterwards, John Phillips created the first public display of a theropod skeleton in Oxford, arranging the known Megalosaurus bones, held by recesses in cardboard sheets, in a more or less natural position.

[31] In 2024 five more sets of tracks were discovered at a nearby Bicester quarry, with one of them showing clear features of large tridactyl theropod feet distinctive of Megalosaurus.

[40] The skeleton of Megalosaurus is highly ossified, indicating a robust and muscular animal, though the lower leg was not as heavily built as that of Torvosaurus, a close relative.

Further restriction occurred in the late 20th and early 21st centuries, researchers such as Ronan Allain and Dan Chure suggesting that the Stonesfield Slate fossils perhaps belonged to several, possibly not directly related, species of theropod dinosaur.

Subsequent research seemed to confirm this hypothesis, and the genus Megalosaurus and species M. bucklandii became generally regarded as limited to the taxon having produced the lectotype, the dentary of the lower jaw.

[33] However, a comprehensive study by Roger Benson and colleagues in 2008, and several related analyses published in subsequent years, overturned the previous consensus by identifying several autapomorphies, or unique distinguishing characteristics, in the lower jaw that could be used to separate Megalosaurus from other megalosaurids.

He saw the absence of Cetiosaurus on the French Armorican Massif as an indication that Megalosaurus too did not live on that island and was limited to the London-Brabant Massif,[31] a tectonic high that during this period formed an island landmass including parts of southern Britain and adjacent areas of northern France, the Netherlands, Belgium and western Gerrmany, suggested to be comparable in size to Cuba with an area of around 100,000 square kilometres (39,000 sq mi).

A possible explanation for this is that the island remained ecologically connected to the much larger landmass comprising northern Britain (the Scottish Massif), the Fennoscandian Shield and the now submerged region in the North Sea between them.

[53] Plant fossils from the Taynton Limestone Formation from which many Megalosaurus fossils originate, representing the nearshore vegetation are largely dominated by conifers (including the living family Araucariaceae and the extinct family Cheirolepidiaceae) as well as the extinct seed plant group Bennettitales, representing a probably seasonally dry environment including mangroves.

During the twentieth century, this practice was gradually discontinued; but scientists discovering theropods that had been mistakenly classified under a different animal group in older literature, still felt themselves forced to rename them, again choosing Megalosaurus as the default generic name.

In 1858, Friedrich August Quenstedt named Megalosaurus cloacinus,[57] based on a probable Late Triassic theropod tooth found near Bebenhausen, specimen SMNH 52457.

[58] In 1869 Eugène Eudes-Deslongchamps named Megalosaurus insignis, the "significant", based on a theropod tooth found near La Hève in Normandy that was 12 centimeters long, a third longer than the teeth of M.

In 1870, Jean-Baptiste Greppin named Megalosaurus meriani based on specimen MH 350, a premaxillary tooth found near Moutier and part of the collection of Peter Merian.

[64] In 1876, J. Henry, a science teacher at Besançon, in a published dissertation named four Late Triassic possible dinosaur teeth found near Moissey Megalosaurus obtusus, "the blunt one".

[88] In 1920, Werner Janensch named Megalosaurus ingens, "the enormous", based on specimen MB R 1050, a 12 centimeter long tooth from German East Africa.

The first was Megalosaurus parkeri, its specific name honouring William Kitchen Parker and based on a pelvis, leg bones and vertebrae from the Late Cretaceous.

[91] The second was Megalosaurus nethercombensis, named after its provenance from Nethercombe and based on two dentaries, leg bones, a pelvis and vertebrae from the Middle Jurassic, which von Huene himself in 1932 made the separate genus Magnosaurus.

[98] In 1955, Albert-Félix de Lapparent named Megalosaurus mersensis based on a series of 23 vertebrae found near Tizi n'Juillerh in a layer of the El Mers Formation of Morocco.