Skull of the Oviraptor

AMNH cast of Khaan mckennai skull

As has been noted all week, Khaan is very similar to other members of its family. That may seem like a common sense notion, but in the family of oviraptorids that is more the norm than an exception. The skulls of oviraptorids are all very similar, possibly the most similar aspect of all of their anatomy, and Khaan is no exception. This may explain, in part, the public knowledge of Khaan. in no way is Khaan popular because it is so regularly seen on television or even in books or other typical outlets for popular dinosaurs. There are exceptions to this rule of course, such as Martyniuk's A Field Guide to Mesozoic Birds and Long's Feathered Dinosaurs. The illustrated versions of the dinosaur in these two books is extravagantly different, but they both have their merits. Regardless, these are two of the only solid mentions of Khaan in popular literature. We saw earlier in the week that a few models have made their way into Spore but no other video games have, as yet, possessed a Khaan model. That fact is a little bit disheartening. Toys are also absent in the realm of popularity of Khaan. For a dinosaur that mainly turns up historical and science fiction websites when its name is searched, however, it is a rather interesting and exciting dinosaur to add to the parade of species. There may be a time when the species is consolidated, or more differences may be discovered that further solidify the validation of Khaan, but until that time this will just have to continue being a rather neat oviraptorid that is under appreciated by the public at large.