A moderately large, swift-footed early carnivorous dinosaur excavated from the Late Triassic marls of the clay pit Gruhalde in the village of Frick, Canton Aargau, Switzerland. The firt two-thirds of the latin genus name Notatesserae... [«nota», feature; «tesserae», tiles used to make a mosaic] refers to the fact that the specimen is showing a mixture of traits of dilophosaurids and coelophysoids (ZAHNER & BRINKMANN 2019).

Frick, also known as the «Dinosaur Eldorado» of Switzerland, is by far the most productive dinosaur locality of this central European country.

• ZAHNER, M. & BRINKMANN, W. (2019): A Triassic averostran-line theropod from Switzerland and the early evolution of dinosaurs. – Nature Ecology & Evolution 3: 1146-1152.

Plateosaurus was a medium large herbivorous to omnivorous dinosaur found in different fossil sites of the Late Triassic of Europe. Recently, it was shown that this reptile was not able to pronate its hands completely (pronation = inward rotation) and, therefore, could not move on its front legs. Thus this dinosaur was cleary biped and walked exclusively on its hind legs. The hands of the short but muscular front legs bore large claws on three fingers, used for defence and feeding.