In Depth At the time of the genus description, Thanatotheristes is known only from very partially preserved skull and jaw bones. However, these bones show that Thanatotheristes was a large tyrannosaur, and one with a close similarity to Daspletosaurus. The discovery of Thanatotheristes has also added further evidence that the tyrannosaurs of Laramidia (the land … Read more
In Depth Although only known from incomplete skull and lower jaw material, Zhuchengtyrannus was still almost certainly one of the largest of the Asian tyrannosaurines. Also, even though the teeth of the holotype are not particularly well preserved, there are more as yet unidentified teeth that are known from that location that may yet prove … Read more
In Depth A relative of the famous Tyrannosaurus, Dynamoterror lived further south in what is now the New Mexico area of the USA. Described after a pain staking process of re-combined the partial remains of the holotype, Dynamoterror was revealed to have been a medium/large nine meter long predatory dinosaur. This is smaller than the … Read more
Classification history and complications When Tarbosaurus fossils were first discovered many of them were actually assigned as new species to the existing tyrannosauroid genera Tyrannosaurus (T. bataar) and Gorgosaurus (G. lancinator & G. novojilovi), as well as the new genus and species, Tarbosaurus efremovi. This classification continued until 1965 when Anatoly Konstantinovich Rozhdestvensky realised that … Read more
In Depth The first remains of Albertosaurus were recovered from the Horseshoe Canyon Formation in 1884, and these were the type specimen along with a smaller skull and some of the post crania. However Albertosaurus was not yet identified and when these parts were studied in 1892 by Edward Drinker Cope, he assigned them to … Read more
In Depth With a name that translates to English as ‘Monstrous murderer’, Teratophoneus has arguably one of the most apt names of any dinosaur, although the remains suggest that it was smaller than many of the other tyrannosaurids. The species name, T.curriei, is in honour of palaeontologist Philip J. Currie. Teratophoneus was a very interesting … Read more