It was offered for sale by Bernard Hauff and it was purchased by the State Museum of Natural History Stuttgart in August 1893.

[1] It was discovered within a chalkstone and shale quarry located between Holzmaden and Zell unter Aichelberg, and it intersected an extremely hard forty centimetres thick layer of Stinkstein chalk, which was deemed worthless.

The rocks were dumped in a ravine and the holotype was discovered there in November 1906 by fossil trader Bernhard Hauff.

[5] A fragmentary specimen of Seeleyosaurus guilelmiimperatoris has also been identified from the Middle Jurassic of Siberia by Menner (1992).

Plesiosaurus dolichodeirus Elasmosauridae and Cryptoclidia Microcleidus homalospondylus Hydrorion brachypterygius Occitanosaurus tournemiensis