| Critique |
The family Archaeopterygidae had been used historically for Archaeopteryx. Paul (1988), however, also included dromaeosaurids (as a subfamily), although his dendrogram (Paul, 1988:224-225) does not show this family as a clade. This usage has not been followed by later authors, who like Gauthier (1986) have coined new taxa for any clade that included dromaeosaurids, Archaeopteryx and birds.
Paul (1888) then erected Archaeopteryginae as a redundant subfamily for Archaeopteryx. There is nothing gained from erecting a redundant taxon, especially one that replaces another taxon (Archaeopterygidae) normally associated with Archaeopteryx and closest of kin.
The nominal author of Archaeopterygidae is Huxley (1871), rather than Huxley (1872; as indicated by Paul 1988). De Beer (1954) is one of the few to provide bibliographic reference to the taxon, which is in the first edition of T. H. Huxley’s (1871) A Manual of the Anatomy of Vertebrated Animals.
|
