It was originally described and named "Helopus", meaning "Marsh Foot", by the Swedish paleontologist Carl Wiman in 1929, after the Greek ἕλος, "helos", "swamp", and πούς, "pous", "foot". The name refers to the marshy area of the finds and to "truga", Swedish swamp shoes, which according to Wiman resembled the wide feet of the animal. This name however, already belonged to a bird because the Caspian tern had once been named "Helopus caspius" Wagler 1832. The sauropod dinosaur was therefore renamed "Euhelopus" (True marsh-foot) in 1956 by Alfred Sherwood Romer. There proved to be a plant genus (a grass) with the same generic name, "Euhelopus". However, a genus in one biological kingdom may have a name that is used as a genus name in another kingdom, so "Euhelopus" was allowed. The type species is "Helopus zdanskyi". The "combinatio nova" is "Euhelopus zdanskyi". The specific name honours Zdansky.