In 1845, Hermann von Meyer officially emended the original species "Ornithocephalus münsteri" to "Pterodactylus münsteri", since the name "Pterodactylus" had been by that point recognized as having priority over "Ornithocephalus". In a subsequent 1846 paper describing a new species of long-tailed 'pterodactyl', von Meyer decided that the long-tailed forms of "Pterodactylus" were different enough from the short-tailed forms to warrant placement in a subgenus, and he named his new species "Pterodactylus (Rhamphorhynchus) gemmingi" after a specimen owned by collector Captain Carl Eming von Gemming that was later by von Gemming sold for three hundred guilders to the Teylers Museum in Haarlem. It was not until 1847 that von Meyer elevated "Rhamphorhynchus" to a full-fledged genus, and officially included in it both long-tailed species of "Pterodactylus" known at the time, "R. longicaudus" (the original species preserving a long tail) and "R. gemmingi". The type species of "Rhamphorhynchus" is "R. longicaudus"; its type specimen or holotype also was sold to the Teylers Museum, where it still resides as TM 6924.