The type specimens, syntypes SAM 3449 and SAM 3450, were described and named in 1924 by Sidney Henry Haughton. They were collected from the Triassic Lower Elliot Formation, dating to the early Norian, on the north slope of the Thaba 'Nyama (Black Mountain) in Transkei, South Africa.[1] The first complete skull of Melanorosaurus was described in 2007.[2] Two species are known: M. readi, the type species, and M. thabanensis named in 1993 by François-Xavier Gauffre, based on holotype MNHN LES-16, a femur found in the Jurassic Upper Elliot Formation.