In the real world, albeit the prehistoric real world of the Late Jurassic Epoch, approximately 150 million years ago, archaeopteryx was a genus of feather dinosaur. Archaeopteryx retained many of the features of small, carnivorous dinosaurs, such as teeth and a long tail, but also had well-developed, feathered wings, suggesting that is was capable of short bursts of active flight. As such, it was once thought to be the earliest known bird.
Anyway, in golfing parlance, ‘archaeopteryx’ is used figuratively, in much the same way as ‘albatross’ or, rarer still, ‘condor’, to describe the rarest of rare birds. However, while ‘albatross’ describes a score of three shots under par on a golf hole and ‘condor’ describes a score of four shots under par, ‘archaeopteryx’ goes to the other extreme of scoring and, as such, is much less desirable. In fact, ‘archaeopteryx’ is the term used to describe a score of 15 shots, or more, over par on a single hole.
Many sources, including reputable sources, attribute the most famous ‘archaeopteryx’ in golfing history to 1927 US Open champion Tommy Armour who, one week after defeating Harry Cooper in an 18-hole playoff at Oakmont Country Club, purportedly scored an 18-over-par 23 on the par-5 seventeenth hole during the third round of the Shawnee Open at the Shawnee Inn & Golf Resort. Various accounts, acscribing the score to drive ten balls out of bounds, or into water, or ‘yips’ on the putting green, are apocryphal. Armour did, indeed, drive two balls out of bounds and miss a two-foot putt, but his final score on the hole was a sextuple-bogey 11, not 21, 22 or 23, as staed elsewhere.