Chasmosaurus

Searched as Protorosaurus. The Paleobiology Database treats Chasmosaurus as the accepted name.

Protorosaurus is an extinct genus of reptile. Members of the genus lived during the late Permian period in what is now Germany and Great Britain. Once believed to have been an ancestor to lizards, Protorosaurus is now known to be one of the oldest and most primitive members of Archosauromorpha, the group that would eventually lead to archosaurs such as crocodilians and dinosaurs.

Chasmosaurus

suvuk79 · Copyrighted free use · via Wikipedia/Commons. May be a photograph of a specimen, or an artist’s reconstruction — an interpretation of a skeleton, since colour and soft tissue are almost never preserved.

On record

Recorded, not inferred
Sits inside
ChasmosaurinaePBDB
Diet
herbivorePBDB, for Ceratopsia
Life habit
ground dwellingPBDB, for Ceratopsia
Motility
actively mobilePBDB, for Ornithischia
Environment
terrestrialPBDB, for Ceratopsia

Time the record covers

At least 170 million years on record.

The record covers at least 254.14 Mya to 83.6 Mya. No occurrence read is dated outside 259.857 Mya to 72.2 Mya.

Permian — about 9 of 30 occurrencesEarly Triassic — about 0 of 30 occurrencesMiddle Triassic — about 0 of 30 occurrencesLate Triassic — about 0 of 30 occurrencesEarly Jurassic — about 0 of 30 occurrencesMiddle Jurassic — about 0 of 30 occurrencesLate Jurassic — about 0 of 30 occurrencesEarly Cretaceous — about 0 of 30 occurrencesLate Cretaceous — about 21 of 30 occurrencesLate Cretaceous264–257 Mya — about 4 occurrences257–251 Mya — about 5 occurrences88–81 Mya — about 4 occurrences81–75 Mya — about 12 occurrences75–68 Mya — about 5 occurrences254.14 Mya83.6 Mya264 Mya68 Mya

30 occurrences of Chasmosaurus on record, most of them in the Late Cretaceous. Bar height is expected occurrences, not a count: each fossil is spread across the span it is dated to, so a tall narrow bar means tight dating and a low wide one means loose.

When

30 occurrences

These are dates about fossils, not the animal: the record can only begin after it arose and end before it died out, so either end may reach further. Shares are expected occurrences: a fossil dated to a span is counted partly in each period it straddles. More on what this infers.

Found in

5 formations

Dinosaur Park — 50.73°N, 111.51°WDinosaur Park — 50.75°N, 111.48°WDinosaur Park — 50.78°N, 111.60°WDinosaur Park — 50.73°N, 111.57°WDinosaur Park — 49.14°N, 110.48°WDinosaur Park — 51.56°N, 108.14°WDinosaur Park — 50.40°N, 111.10°WWerra — 51.26°N, 8.88°EWerra — 51.52°N, 11.52°EWerra — 50.99°N, 9.93°EWerra — 50.88°N, 10.26°EWerra — 50.83°N, 10.33°EWerra — 51.64°N, 11.75°EWerra — 50.98°N, 10.01°EMarl Slate — 54.73°N, 1.46°WMarl Slate — 54.62°N, 1.62°WOldman — 50.63°N, 111.62°WJudith River — 46.40°N, 109.66°W

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The named rock units Chasmosaurus has been recovered from, largest first. Drawn where the rock is now, not where it formed. 1 occurrence has no formation on record, which is common for older literature.

Chasmosaurus and its relatives

Late Cretaceous

Where Chasmosaurus and its relatives were recorded in the Late Cretaceous.

Found in the same rock

52 taxa

The Paleobiology Database records 21 sites for Chasmosaurus, and this reads all of them. The number is how many of those sites it was catalogued from too. The 24 sharing the most are listed.

This is not a list of everything alive at the time. It is only what has come out of the same ground as this animal and been written down.

Entered from

20 references

Each of the 30 occurrences read was entered from one of these publications, ordered by how many each accounts for. This is not a search for papers mentioning the name. 8 further references are not listed. Entries link to doi.org where the Paleobiology Database holds an identifier, and to its own record where it does not. Relayed as the Paleobiology Database holds them, not checked against what they resolve to.

Media and terms

Media content2

Picture of Chasmosaurus

Credit
suvuk79
Licence
Copyrighted free use
Commercial use
cannot be read from the licence given — check the record

CT scan

Licence
In Copyright
Commercial use
cannot be read from the licence given — check the record
Specimen
Protorosaurus speneri · NMK:S180

The description on this site

Licence
CC BY-SA 4.0

This is what the site found, which is not the same as what exists.

Keep going

What may have been alongside itChasmosaurinae through timeFormations of the Late CretaceousThe world it lived on

Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0. Lambe 1914