Wikipedia:Today's featured article/October 17, 2013

Herrerasaurus was one of the earliest dinosaurs. Its name means "Herrera's lizard", after Victorino Herrera, a goatherd who discovered the first specimen. All known fossils of Herrerasaurus have been discovered in northwestern Argentina in rocks dated to 231.4 million years ago. It was a lightly built bipedal carnivore with a long tail and a relatively small head. Its length is estimated at 3–6 meters (10–20 ft) and it may have weighed around 210–350 kilograms (463–772 lb). The type species, Herrerasaurus ischigualastensis, was described by Osvaldo Reig in 1963 and is the only species assigned to the genus. Where Herrerasaurus and its close relatives lie on the early dinosaur evolutionary tree is unclear. For many years, it was known from very fragmentary remains. However, with the discovery of an almost complete skeleton and skull in 1988, Herrerasaurus has been classified as either an early theropod or an early saurischian, with many researchers treating it at least tentatively as the most primitive member of Theropoda. It is a member of the Herrerasauridae, a family of similar genera that were among the earliest of the dinosaurian evolutionary radiation.

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