A Giant Dinosaur from the Earliest Jurassic of South Africa and the Transition to Quadrupedality in Early Sauropodomorphs

Sauropod dinosaurs were dominant, bulk-browsing herbivores for 130 million years of the Mesozoic, attaining gigantic body masses in excess of 60 metric tons [1, 2]. A columnar-limbed, quadrupedal posture enabled these giant body sizes [3], but the nature of the transition from bipedal sauropodomorph ancestors to derived quadrupeds remains contentious [4-6]. We describe a gigantic, new sauropodomorph from the earliest Jurassic of South Africa weighing 12 metric tons and representing a phylogenetically independent origin of sauropod-like body size in a non-sauropod. Osteohistological evidence shows that this specimen was an adult of maximum size and approximately 14 years old at death. Ledumahadi mafube gen. et sp. nov. shows that gigantic body sizes were possible in early sauropodomorphs, which were habitual quadrupeds but lacked the derived, columnar limb postures of sauropods. We use data from this new taxon and a discriminant analysis of tetrapod limb measurements to study postural evolution in sauropodomorphs. Our results show that quadrupedality appeared by the mid-Late Triassic (Norian), well outside of Sauropoda. Secondary reversion to bipedality occurred in some lineages phylogenetically close to Sauropoda, indicating early experimentation in locomotory styles. Morphofunctional observations support the hypothesis that partially flexed (rather than columnar) limbs characterized Ledumahadi and other early-branching quadrupedal sauropodomorphs. Patterns of locomotory and body-size evolution show that quadrupedality allowed Triassic sauropodomorphs to achieve body sizes of at least 3.8 metric tons. Ledumahadi's Early Jurassic age shows that maximum body mass in sauropodomorph dinosaurs was either unaffected or rapidly rebounded after the end-Triassic extinction event.