Diplodocus now common scientific opinion that "Seismosaurus hallorum" is a species of "Diplodocus". This genus of dinosaurs lived in what is now mid-western North America at the end of the Jurassic period. "Diplodocus" is one of the more common dinosaur fossils found in the middle to upper Morrison Formation, between about 154 and 152 million years ago, during the late Kimmeridgian age. The Morrison Formation records an environment and time dominated by gigantic sauropod dinosaurs, such as "Apatosaurus", "Barosaurus", "Brachiosaurus", "Brontosaurus", and "Camarasaurus". "Diplodocus" is among the most easily identifiable dinosaurs, with its typical sauropod shape, long neck and tail, and
Dinosaur in traditional medicines, a practice that continues today. In Europe, dinosaur fossils were generally believed to be the remains of giants and other biblical creatures. Scholarly descriptions of what would now be recognized as dinosaur bones first appeared in the late 17th century in England. Part of a bone, now known to have been the femur of a "Megalosaurus", was recovered from a limestone quarry at Cornwell near Chipping Norton, Oxfordshire, in 1676. The fragment was sent to Robert Plot, Professor of Chemistry at the University of Oxford and first curator of the Ashmolean Museum, who published a description in