A. siemensii Berlin specimen - MB. Av. 101 is well preserved and the second most primitive Solnhofen bird.

Archaeopteryx lithographica (Meyer 1861) Late Jurassic ~150 mya, 30-50 cm in length. Discovered first as a single feather, now there are eleven skeletal specimens of Solnhofen birds. No two of the tested specimens are conspecific. Each add or subtract traits to be listed shortly.

A. siemensii? Thermopolis specimen - WDC CSG 100 is the most primitive of the Solnhofen birds. It needs a new generic name.

A. siemensii Berlin specimen - MB. Av. 101 is well preserved and the second most primitive Solnhofen bird.

A. lithographica The London specimen - BMNH 37001, is the holoytype for the genus and species. It is basal to Hesperornis.

A. lithographica Liaoning enantiornithine embryo - IVPP V14238 is most closely related to the London specimen and is from the Liaoning province of China.

A. bavarica Munich specimen - BSp 1999 I 50 is near the base of the Scansoriopterygidae, derived from a sister to specimen #12 (below). Both need new generic names.

Jurapteryx recurva The Eichstaett specimen - JM 2257 is basal to living birds, like Gallus and their fossil kin.

Wellnhoferia grandis The Solnhofen specimen - BSp 1999 nests with the toothless bird, Confuciusornis.

Specimen #11 - private - nests at the base of the genus Sapeornis (Foth et al 2014).

Specimen #12 - undescribed, private - nests near the base of the Scansorioptergidae

Liaoning embryo (Zhang and Zhou 2004, Barremian, 121 mya) a small, precocial, final stage bird embryo from the Liaoning Province (Early Cretaceous, 121mya, IVPP V14238). Strangely, no eggshell was preserved, but the tucked shape of the embryo indicated that it had not yet hatched. Northern China was a forested landscape dominated by active volcanoes and sprinkled with lakes and streams at the time. No adults were closely associated. Originally considerered an enantiornithine. Here it nests with the London specimen, the basalmost enantiornithine.

Alonso PD, Milner AC, Ketcham RA, Cookson MJ and Rowe TB 2004. The avian nature of the brain and inner ear of Archaeopteryx Nature 430, 666-669(5 August 2004)

Dames W 1884. Ueber Archaeopteryx. Palaeontologische Abhandlungen, 2 (3):119-198.

Foth C, Tischlinger H and Rauhut OWM 2014. New specimen of Archaeopteryx provides insights into the evolution.of pennaceous feathers. Nature 511:79–83.DOI: 10.1038/nature13467

Heller F 1959. Ein dritter Archaeopteryx Fund aus den Solnhofener Plattenkalken von Langenaltheim/Mfr. Erlanger Geologische Abhandlungen, 31: 1-25; Erlangen

von Meyer H 1861. Archaeopteryx litographica (Vogel-Feder) und Pterodactylus von Solenhofen. Neues Jahrbuch für Mineralogie, Geognosie, Geologie und Petrefakten-Kunde. 1861: 678–679.

Owen R 1863. On the Archaeopteryx von Meyer, with a description of the fossil remains of a long-tailed species from the lithographic stone of Solnhofen. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society, London 153: 33-47.

Paul G 2002. Dinosaurs of the Air: The Evolution and Loss of Flight in Dinosaurs and Birds. Johns Hopkins University Press. 460 pp.

Wellnhofer P 1974. Das fünfte Skelettexemplar von Archaeopteryx. Palaeontographica Abt. A Vol. 147 S: 168-216.

Zhou Z and Zhang F-C 2004. A Precocial Avian Embryo from the Lower Cretaceous of China. BREVIA Science 22 October 2004: 306 no. 5696 p. 653. DOI: 10.1126/science.1100000. online abstract here

wiki/Archaeopteryx