A sauropodomorph dinosaur from the Upper Triassic (Carnian) of southern Brazil

Three newly discovered skeletons from the Carnian red beds of the Santa Maria Formation, south Brazil, represent one of the oldest dinosaurs ever found. The new taxon, Saturnalia tupiniquim, is equivalent in age to the earliest dinosaurs from northwestern Argentina, being the oldest sauropodomorph dinosaur known from plentiful skeletal material. The record of Saturnalia, a 1.5-m-long gracile plant-eating animal, indicates that, like other major dinosaur lineages, the first representatives of the mainly heavy-built sauropodomorphs were gracile animals. ((C) 1999 Academie des sciences/Editions scientifiques et medicales Elsevier SAS.).