The first named specimen of "Rhamphorhynchus" was brought to the attention of Samuel Thomas von Sömmerring by the collector Georg Graf zu Münster in 1825. Von Sömmerring concluded that it belonged to an ancient bird. When further preparation uncovered teeth, Graf zu Münster sent a cast to Professor Georg August Goldfuss, who recognised it as a pterosaur. Like most pterosaurs described in the mid 19th century, "Rhamphorhynchus" was originally considered to be a species of "Pterodactylus". However, at the time, many scientists incorrectly considered "Ornithocephalus" to be the valid name for "Pterodactylus". This specimen of "Rhamphorhynchus" was therefore originally named "Ornithocephalus Münsteri". This was first mentioned in 1830 by Graf zu Münster himself. However, the description making the name valid was given by Goldfuss in an 1831 follow-up to Münster's short paper. Note that the ICZN later ruled that non-standard Latin characters, such as "ü", would not be allowed in scientific names, and the spelling "münsteri" was emended to "muensteri" by Richard Lydekker in 1888.