Hip bone The hip bone first appears in fishes, where it consists of a simple, usually triangular bone, to which the pelvic fin articulates. The hip bones on each side usually connect with each other at the forward end, and are even solidly fused in lungfishes and sharks, but they never attach to the vertebral column. In the early tetrapods, this early hip bone evolved to become the ischium and pubis, while the ilium formed as a new structure, initially somewhat rod-like in form, but soon adding a larger bony blade. The acetabulum is already present at the point where the three
Aphanosauria "Marasuchus" (other avemetatarsalians) have their ischia only slightly contact at the middle portion of each bone. The tip of the ischium is also rounded and semi-triangular in cross-section, with the lateral (outer) face of each ischium thinning towards the lower edge of the bone while the medial (inner) face is flat and contacts the other ischium. Poposauroids and dinosaurs also have rounded ischia, but lack the semi-triangular shape, which is also known in "Asilisaurus". The ischium also has a groove on the upper part of the shaft. Unlike dinosaurs, aphanosaurs have an acetabulum (hip socket) which is closed up by