Vouivria

[1][2] The same year, baron Jean de Dorlodot published an article about the excavation process, considering most bones part of a single sauropod skeleton, washed into the sea by river flooding.

[3] The company donated the bones to the Muséum national d'histoire naturelle at Paris where preparator Pansard partly freed them from the rock matrix.

In 1943, de Lapparent published a description referring the sauropod bones to Bothriospondylus madagascariensis, a species based on fragmentary remains from Madagascar.

The generic name is a latinisation of French la vouivre — itself derived from Latin vipera, "adder" — a winged dragon or wyvern from local legend.

French writer Marcel Aymé in 1941 dedicated a famous novel to this theme, La Vouivre, the creature taking the shape of a beautiful lady adorned with an enormous ruby.

From this it was concluded in 2017 that the animal had died in situ near a coastal lagoon, its weight forming a lens in soft chalkstone, and after an exposure of several years during which it was scavenged by theropods, was covered by a new chalk layer which protected the bones after hardening.

The humerus or upper arm bone, has a deltopectoral crest, serving for the attachment of the deltoid muscle and the pectoralis major, that doubles in transverse width to below.

This was confirmed by a phylogenetic analysis in 2017, showing Vouivria to be a basal member of the Brachiosauridae, placed above Europasaurus and below Brachiosaurus altithorax in the evolutionary tree.

Original excavation plan
Humerus
Life restoration
Teeth