Nos. 620-621] STUDIES IX PALEOPATHOLOGY 385 



longirostris Cuvier has the jaw gaping as if trismus was 

 not an accompaniment of opisthotonos, such as is usually 

 the case in recent times, or else the jaw was secondarily 

 moved by the action of the water after the dissolution of 



the muscles. Other pterodactyls, such as Pterodactylus 

 scolopaciceps, P. longicollum, and others described by 

 Plieninger 2 from the Jura of Swabia show no indication 

 of any spastic distress. 



The toothed bird (Fig. 2), Archeopteryx macroura, 

 from the lithographic slates, commonly figured in the 

 textbooks of geology, zoology, and paleontology, exhibits 

 a pronounced opisthotonos, which may be slightly exag- 

 gerated in all the slender-necked vertebrates having a rela- 

 tively heavy head. The weight of the head may have 

 added to the curve, but the position is none the less a 

 genuine opisthotonos. The skeleton of a small dinosaur. 



2 Paleontographica, Bd. LOT, pp. 210-333, 6 Tafeln, 1907. 



