NAME

Meaning - Carcharodontosaurus means “shark-toothed lizard”
Pronounced - kahr-KAR-o-DON-to-SAW-us
Named By - Stromer
When Named - 1931
DIET

Carnivore (meat-eater). Carcharodontosaurus was a large, fierce predator that could kill even large sauropods; Carcharodontosaurus may also have been a scavenger.
SIZE

Length - 26-44 feet (8-14 m) long
Height - 12 ft (3.6 m) tall at the hips
Weight - 6-8 tons
WHEN IT LIVED

Middle Cretaceous period, about 110 to 90 million years ago.
WHERE IT LIVED

Fossils have been found in North Africa.
FOSSILS

Carcharodontosaurus was first known from an incomplete North African skull and a few bones found by Depret and Savornin in 1927 (originally called Megalosaurus saharicus). These fossils were destroyed during World War II. In 1996, Paul Sereno and his team found another Carcharodontosaurus in North Africa; it was even larger than the older specimen.
CLASSIFICATION
  • Kingdom Animalia (animals)
  • Phylum Chordata (having a hollow nerve chord ending in a brain)
  • Class Archosauria (diapsids with socket-set teeth, etc.)
  • Order Saurischia - lizard-hipped dinosaurs
  • Suborder Theropoda - bipedal carnivores
  • Tetanura - advanced theropods with three fingers
  • Superfamily Carnosauria - allosaurids and their relatives
  • Family Allosauridae
  • Genus Carcharodontosaurus
  • Species C. saharicus (type species named by Stromer, 1931)
INTERESTING FACTS

Carcharodontosaurus was a huge meat eating dinosaur from the Cretaceous period. This North African carnosaur had a massive tail, a bulky body, and heavy bones. Its arms were short and had three-fingered hands with sharp claws. Although Carcharodontosaurus was larger than T. rex, its brain was smaller. Carcharodontosaurus was closely related to Giganotosaurus but not to T. rex. Carcharodontosaurus was a more primitive dinosaur than T. rex.
LINKS

A detailed page on Carcharodontosaurus.
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