Scipionyx was discovered in the spring of 1981 by Giovanni Todesco, an amateur paleontologist, near Pietraroja, approximately 50 kilometers from Naples. The fossils were preserved in the Pietraroia limestone formation, well known for unusually well-preserved fossils. Todesco thought the remains belonged to that of a fossil bird. Unaware of the importance of his findings, he kept the strange fossil in the basement of his house until 1992 when he met two paleontologists, Cristiano dal Sasso of the Natural History Museum of Milan and Marco Signore of the University of Naples Federico II, who identified it as the first Italian dinosaur. The magazine Oggi gave the tiny dinosaur the nickname Ciro, a typical Neapolitan name. In 1998, Scipionyx made the front cover of Nature.