Foth and Rauhut 2026 review the Solnhofen birds = ‘Archaeopteryx’

Foth and Rauhut 2026 wrote in their abstract,
“Specimens of Archaeopteryx probably represent more than a single species, but the results from different analyses are currently contradictory and inconclusive.”

Their taxon list includes only six outgroup taxa. That’s too few.
Only seven Solnhofen birds. That’s two too few.
Only two ingroup taxa not Solnhofen in origin. One is supragreneric. The other is Sapeornis. That’s way too few.
Compare those numbers to those in the early bird subset of the LRT (Fig 2).

The authors concluded,
“Apart from the Haarlem and Mühlheim specimens, the specimen-based phylogeny found that all Urvogel specimens from the Late Jurassic of southern Germany, including the Solnhofen specimen, form a monophyletic group that represents the genus Archaeopteryx.”

By contrast and by including many more ingroup and outgroup taxa,
the large reptile tree (LRT, 2340 taxa) lumped and split nine Late Jurassic German birds with teeth and long bony tails (Fig 1) in the following cladogram (Fig 2).

When more taxa are added
to analysis (Fig 2), the Solnhofen birds begin to split apart. That means there was already a phylogenetic variety at that time. Some of the taxa represented the very first flapping birds. Others were derived and basal to several bird clades.

That’s why Foth and Rauhut needed to add more taxa.

As of today,
only ReptileEvolution.com has reconstructed nine Solnhofen birds to scale (Fig 1). The others are far from complete and so are not tested in the LRT. Foth and Rauhut did not publish reconstructions. They published measurements.

Here (Fig 2) the non-Archaeopteryx taxa attract and separate some Solnhofen birds apart from lumping with one another. Foth and Rauhut largely omitted these taxa, except for Sapeornis.

‘Archaeopteryx‘ continues to be
a brand name paleontologists are loathe to leave.

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

The authors’ links
to their Mesquite file and figures are currently ‘NOT FOUND’ = broken, misspelled, not uploaded.

Thanks to reader, Sean,
for bringing this paper to my attention.

References
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
Foth C and Rauhut OWM 2026. Considerations on the taxonomy of Late Jurassic Avialae (Theropoda) from the Sonhofen Archipelago. Fossil Record 29:2 DOI 10.3897/fr.29.200245
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

Source: https://pterosaurheresies.wordpress.com/2026/09/21/foth-and-rauhut-2026-review-the-solnhofen-birds-archaeopteryx/