The first Spinosaurus skeleton was discovered by Richard Markgraf in 1912. From the 1910’s to recent and current years, the structure and information of Spinosaurus has changed multiple times with each new found study constantly changing its beliefs and theories of how it lived and looked before it went extinct.
Since its first discovery in 1912, due to the destruction left from WWII, a lot of its skeletal structure was destroyed, leaving now many complete and fragmented bones left. It was believed that it was a land animal that stood up straight like the early T-Rex and other early depicted theropods. In 1934, new fragments were brought up, including vertebrae and a hindleg bone. The founder of these fragments Stromer believed it was from another genus of spinosaurus known as Spinosaurus B. But with more expeditions and material, it was discovered to belong to either Carcharodontosaurus (Kaar-kr-uh-daan-tuh-sawr-us) and Sigilmassasaurus. (See-jil-mah-se-sawr-us).
In the 1990’s, new discoveries were found, revealing the spinosaurus didn’t have a short snout like other theropods, but actually had a crocodile-like snout as well as bones indicating it may have been the largest theropod ever found. The knowledge of it standing up straight and being a pure land theropod were debunked as it was discovered to have eaten mainly fish and scavenged on land for meat. More bones and fragments were found that belonged to its back sailfin.
In 2020, a brand new discovery of Spinosaurus had been revealed that it was an aquatic predator and its vertebrae provided evidence that the tail was used for aquatic locomotion and its curved claws were for snatching up fish in the water rather than being used to walk on land. It is also now depicted that it spent its entire life in the water. Researchers have said that Spinosaurus has a tail with an unusual and unique shape that consists of extremely tall neural spines and elongate chevrons, which forms a large, flexible fin-like organ capable of extensive lateral excursion.
This is how Spinosaurus has changed from 1912 to 2020 and current years. For all we know, this is the Spinosaurus we all know about now but perhaps that’s not all about this interesting aquatic theropod. In a few years or in the near future, we could discover more about Spinosaurus and more as the years go on and the paleontologists uncover more and more of this dinosaur’s secrets and lifestyle. Spinosaurus is one of the most interesting fossils we have recovered and are still discovering and learning about.
