Chilantaisaurus

Live reconstruction of Chilantaisaurus

• Asia (China)

• Chilantaisaurus tashuikouensis

Chilantaisaurus ( "lizard of Chilantai " ) is a genus theropod dinosaurs ( Theropoda ) from the Upper Cretaceous, the fossils in the Dashuigou formation in Inner Mongolia ( People's Republic of China) have been found. So far, only the type species of the genus C. was tashuikouensis reliably allocated. Chilantaisaurus lived about 93-89 million years ago in the Turonian.

Chilantaisaurus was like all theropods a bipedal carnivorous dinosaur. It reached a length of up to 11 meters and a height of about 4 meters. The weight was about 4 tons. A special feature was an unusually elongated claw on the first finger of the hand. The phylogenetic position of Chilantaisaurus is uncertain: Hu (1964) and Harris ( 1998a ) assigned him to the Allosauriden, Kurzanov (1989) and Molnar et al. (1990 ) suggested a systematic position between Allosaurus and tyrannosaurids and Sereno et al. (1994 ) found this species in the Spinosauroidea.

He shared its habitat with other predatory dinosaurs like Shaochilong and the herbivorous Gobisaurus.

See also: Jartai Yanchi ( Jilantai Yanchi )