Samson's height pt2

In my previous post, I dealt with the myth of the mounted skeleton of the "Samson" Tyrannosaurus specimen being ~4.6 meters tall at the hips. The skeletal mount itself turned out to be only around ~3.7 meters tall at the top of the hips. But even then, it's ilium is reconstructed somewhat too deep, in contrast to what actual Tyrannosaurus ilia suggest.

While Samson does have a preserved fibula and fragments of it's tibia, their measurements weren't listed.

I tried my hand at reconstructing Samson's hindlimbs. Parts in light gray are preserved but not measured.

Unmeasured and missing limb portions were scaled using FMNH PR2081 as a guide. The ilium is based on that of AMNH 5027, and FMNH PR2081 was used as a guide to cross-scale it.

Here's the measurements:
Ilium length = ~144.33 centimeters
Femur length = ~129.5 centimeters
Tibia length =  ~112.9 centimeters
Fibula length =  ~102.3 centimeters
Total hip height = ~341.4 centimeters

It actually ends up at a normal Tyrannosaurus rex hip height. Not surprising, given that it's known bone measurements are really no larger than that of a normal large Tyrannosaurus rex specimen (and smaller than those of FMNH PR2081).

Here's how it compares to the mythical ~4.6-meter Samson:

Notice how the real Samson's bones obviously don't fit in a ~4.6-meter hip?

references/sources
Scott Hartman's Tyrannosaurus skeletals
Theropod Database
AMNH 5027 illustration

Samson's height

Tyrannosaurus is 4 meters tall, blah blah blah. That's what most random online sources tall you.

But that figure is total nonsense, a fantasy with no basis in reality. In reality, T. rex's hip height levels out at around ~3.5 meters, give or take, whether the T. rex be Stan to CM 9380 to Sue.

Tyrannosaurus rex skeletal reconstructions by Scott Hartman. I do not own anything from this.

But is Sue the tallest Tyrannosaurus? Some, well, sources (including Wikipedia) states that Samson is the tallest known T. rex at an alleged ~4.6 meters in hip height. This is a mounted skeleton of Samson, with a woman standing next to the skeleton for scale:

Samson's mounted skeleton, mostly speculative though

And here's Samson's known bones and measurements, from the Theropod Database:

"skull (1.4 m), mandibles (dentary 870 mm), twenty-two teeth, nine cervical vertebrae, two cervical ribs, seven dorsal vertebrae, ten dorsal ribs, seventeen caudal vertebrae, four chevrons, femora (1.295 m), tibial fragments, fibula, metatarsal II (610 mm), metatarsal III, metatarsal IV (635 mm), ten pedal phalanges"

Samson's mounted skeleton measured

 If Samson were to be ~4.6 meters tall at the hips, then the woman standing next to it would have to be around ~1.99 meters tall. Although not impossible, women, or for that matter, humans, of that height are rare, and they tend to have more elongated builds. Assuming that this woman is almost 2 meters tall isn't the most parsimonius option. Also, this would make Samson's femur around ~1.61 meters long, which is a whopping ~24.32% longer than the measurement from the Theropod Database.

Assuming an average height of ~1.65 meters for the woman, Samson would be around ~3.8 meters tall at the hips. It's much lower than the exaggerated ~4.6 meter figure, but it's still a bit too high, as this would make Samson's femur around ~1.33 meters long, longer than the actual femur measurement.

Taking the femur length of ~1.295 meters, this yields a total hip height of ~3.7 meters for Samson (while the woman would be around ~1.6 meters tall). This is quite tall for a Tyrannosaurus, but not so tall as to be implausible.

Taller than Sue? Maybe, if that ilium, which isn't actually known from Samson, was actually reconstructed accurately. Why is the front part of that ilium so much higher than the rear portion, with a steep transition closer to the rear portion? That's not the case with Tyrannosaurus ilia.

Tyrannosaurus rex specimen AMNH 5027. Notice the ilium shape.

Sue and Stan skeletal reconstructions by Scott Hartman. Notice their ilium shape.

We'll see more about Samson in the next post.

Possibly the largest biped ever...and it's from the Triassic

Many people think of the Triassic as the time when dinosaurs were relatively minor players in the scene, being runts in a world full of non-dinosaur giants.

This isn't true. There are already large dinosaurs in the Triassic, especially the basal sauropodomorphs, also known as "prosauropods", some of which can grow up to multiple tonnes in mass.

But there is one.

One basal sauropodomorph to rule them all.

One so large, it would completely change your entire concept of Triassic animal life.

One so large, that it takes the throne of the largest known biped.

Unfortunately, it doesn't have a name yet.


This paper: A Diplodocus-sized basal sauropodomorph from the Late Triassic of South Africa

This piece of scientific literature speaks of a dinosaur in the legendary size class by pre-Jurassic standards. Estimated at up to ~15 tonnes, it competes in size with midsize Jurassic sauropods such as Diplodocus, and throws Spinosaurus right off the throne of largest known biped.

It also shows that you don't need to be a Jurassic or a Cretaceous dinosaur to be a legendary giant.

This dinosaur is closely related to Aardonyx. It's bones are, on average, ~190% of the dimensions of Aardonyx bones. It's femur alone is ~1.5 meters long, longer than any known theropod femur.

This image below should give you an idea of size. The king of the tyrant dinosaurs only just about matches the enormous Triassic legend in height only, and consider that basal sauropodomorphs are pretty low-slung for their size. This comparison doesn't even address the increase in bulkiness and robusticity that the large size would have required due to natural scaling laws.

Maybe we should reconsider about how we picture the Triassic period. Maybe it wasn't too different from the two later periods.
Tyrannosaurus based on Scott Hartman's skeletal.

Are conservative reconstructions that much better than liberal ones?

Are they?

Most who look into the palaeozoology field thinks so, and even I thought so. We assume that fragmentary taxa look just like their relatives.

But after Deinocheirus, which with it's unique, unexpected features, does this line of thought still hold true? We have long assumed Deinocheirus to look just like a plain ornithomimosaur, but much larger.

To me, at least, it placed doubt on my idea of conservative > liberal in palaeo-restorations.

Conservative reconstructions may still be better than liberal ones, but the difference between their validity may likely never be as significant as it once was, to me at least.

We shoudn't attach glorifying lables to any animal. Yes, not even humans.

Earth has been populated by billions of animal species throughout the ~3,800,000,000-billion year history of life. Over a million, in extant animal species alone, has been discovered.

Yet, few are known to the general public, and yet fewer are actually recognized as significant. And those few are often overrated. Part of the reason why this is so, is because of the titles given to certain animal species/genera.


Some examples:

Tyrannosaurus rex = "King of dinosaurs"
Homo sapiens(anatomically modern humans) = "Crown of creation"
Argentinosaurus huinculensis = "Largest dinosaur ever"
Balaenoptera musculus = "Largest animal ever"
Panthera leo(Lion)  = "King of the beasts"


These titles draw quite a lot of attention most of the time, often away from many interesting species. Although the case with Homo sapiens can't really be helped, can't it? Popularizing selected genera instead of giving all of them the spotlight, causes massive fanbases that can be quite stubborn at times, such as the case of the Tyrannosaurus fanbase.

We should not be giving any glorification titles to any species at all. The amount of potential undiscovered species is too vast. There may very well be a titanic ~10+ tonne carnosaur, a ~250-350 tonne ichthyosaur, or even a sapient species that went extinct millions of years ago and thus had their civilization crumble completely long before humans evolved, buried down there. We don''t really know what's down or out there.

There is an ocean of unknowns out there. Consider them, and do not glorify the known creatures as if they were the absolute pinnacle of an attribute. Stop with the title giving.

Do not call Tyrannosaurus the king, stop the overly biased anthropocentric views, stop with the "whales are the largest ever" statements. As mentioned before, there is a vast ocean of unknowns out there, and ignoring this is foolish.