Re: [dinosaur] Gnathovorax, new herrerasaurid (open access)

Ben Creisler
[email protected]


Brazilian news stories are translating the name as: mandíbulas vorazes,
"voracious jaws"'

'significa mandíbulas vorazes, "[voracious jaws]"'

https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=https-3A__gauchazh.clicrbs.com.br_tecnologia_noticia_2019_11_fossil-2Dde-2Dum-2Ddos-2Dmais-2Dantigos-2Ddinossauros-2Dpredadores-2Ddo-2Dmundo-2De-2Ddescoberto-2Dno-2Drs-2Dck2ujblhp00a701ph9ewqf4ss.html&d=DwIFaQ&c=clK7kQUTWtAVEOVIgvi0NU5BOUHhpN0H8p7CSfnc_gI&r=Ry_mO4IFaUmGof_Yl9MyZgecRCKHn5g4z1CYJgFW9SI&m=gHZbLHynasd0iLL9J4sG2Wz0vWAfvT7mMNN8m75IVkc&s=X9cEbGJUg_L8WWcxp-YOrvubMk409YGaT15GOnePMBw&e= 

An English language news item gives the meaning of the name as "ravenous
jaws":

'The skeleton is virtually intact – including razor-sharp teeth and claws
that would have made it a ferocious 'killing machine.' Its name means
"ravenous jaws!"'

https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=https-3A__www.thelondoneconomic.com_news_science_worlds-2Doldest-2Dmeat-2Deating-2Ddinosaur-2Dhas-2Dbeen-2Dunearthed_11_11_&d=DwIFaQ&c=clK7kQUTWtAVEOVIgvi0NU5BOUHhpN0H8p7CSfnc_gI&r=Ry_mO4IFaUmGof_Yl9MyZgecRCKHn5g4z1CYJgFW9SI&m=gHZbLHynasd0iLL9J4sG2Wz0vWAfvT7mMNN8m75IVkc&s=QoS-PF88jSMvRWiPFxpbBJne3xNKRcydrBWrg2HW6no&e= 

==
Gnathovorax is  a hybrid of Greek noun gnathos "jaw" and the Latin
adjective vorax "devouring"--so applying Greek rules is questionable. Latin
had  more restrictive rules about word order in compounds that would not
work here. It's a Neo-Latin invention that  has to be seen as an arbitrary
name formation that means what the authors wanted it to mean regardless of
classical practices.

As I have noted before, there really are no rules in Neo-Latin--it's what
usage makes it. With the 2020 implementation of the PhyloCode, the ICZN
rules and recommendations on most remaining Latin rules (such as matching
or correcting genders in changed genus and species combinations) are
dropped for people who decide to use the PhyloCode.

On Mon, Nov 11, 2019 at 7:50 AM David Marjanovic <[email protected]>
wrote:

> Gesendet: Montag, 11. November 2019 um 04:26 Uhr
> Von: "Brad McFeeters" <[email protected]>
>
> > Notably, Pacheco et al. (2019) seem to be the first study to recover
> *Pisanosaurus* closer to Ornithischia than to Silesauridae, after taking
> into account the studies that find it as a silesaurid.
>
> The first published study, yes...
>
> > Etymologically, is *Gnathovorx* the "devouring jaw," or the "devourer of
> jaws"?
>
> It's "the jaw-voracious one". Whether that means it devours jaws or _has_
> jaws is left to context.
>
> (Greek abounds in compound adjectives, at least in poetry. The area around
> Argos is routinely called "the horse-nourishing Argolid" in the Iliad, for
> instance.)
>