8 Dinosaurs With Long Names You’ll Want to Learn More About
Dinosaurs are known for having complicated and long names. Compared to some of the dinosaurs with the longest names, however, normal dinosaur names are a breeze. After all, the dinosaur with the longest name has a total of 23 letters.
So what are the dinosaurs with long names? You’ll have to read below to find out. You might even get to learn about your next favorite dinosaur from the list below.
What is the Dinosaur With the Longest Name?
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The dinosaur with the longest name wins by a landslide. This dinosaur has a name with a whopping 23 letters. The next longest name only has 19 letters, meaning that our winner wins by four letters.
But what dinosaur has the longest name? That would be Micropachycephalosaurus. Confused about where to even begin to pronounce the name? It’s pronounced “my-crow-pack-ee-seff-ah-low-sore-us”. The name comes from Greek origin and means something along the lines of “tiny, thick-headed lizard”.
If you think that name is long, that’s not even the full name. Dong Zhiming, the paleontologist that first found and named the dinosaur gave it the full title, “Micropachycephalosaurus hongtuyanensis”.
Despite the length of its title, it is a tiny dinosaur. It measures about two feet long and weighs less than 10 pounds. This would make it about the size of a small dog. Unfortunately, not much is known about this dinosaur. It was found in China in 1978, but the skull has since been lost.
With this being the only somewhat put-together skull, though it was still incomplete and fragmented, the information about this little dinosaur is few and far between. With the skull now missing, it’s unlikely that much more information is going to be found unless a new specimen is discovered.
Many scientists have started to doubt whether or not this little dinosaur was related to other pachy dinosaurs with thick skulls. Instead, some suggest it might be a part of the triceratops dinosaur family. With the skull of the only found representative of the species missing, there’s no way to confirm or deny the theory.
It’s not all a mystery surrounding this species, however. The Micropachycephalosaurus is an herbivore. This means it eats plants, instead of other animals. It’s also thought to be bipedal, meaning it walked on two legs instead of four. The third theory is that the little dinosaur had quills or spines that ran up the length of its tail.
Based on other similar dinosaur species, scientists believe it traveled in groups and was a rather fast runner. The skill also dated back to the Late Cretaceous period, meaning this dinosaur was alive between 70 and 80 million years ago.
Other Dinosaurs With the Longest Names
While Micropachycephalosaurus wins out for having the longest name of all the dinosaurs yet recorded, there are plenty of other dinosaurs with long names. The next longest-named dinosaurs have between 17 and 19 letters in their names.
1. Carcharodontosaurus
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The dinosaur with the second longest name is the Carcharodontosaurus. This technically wasn’t a singular dinosaur, but a genus of dinosaurs. This genus was a group of carnivorous theropods.
They lived in the Cretaceous Period roughly 100 million years ago. The genus of this group was considered the largest land predator at the time. Based on the bones, these dinosaurs measured up to 41 feet tall and an unbelievable 14,000 pounds.
Based on stomach contents, these dinosaurs weren’t picky by any means. They ate a mix of sauropods, ornithopods, and even other predators. Their teeth were sharp and blade-like. They were also spaced fairly far apart.
This meant that their teeth were exclusively for ripping prey to pieces before swallowing chunks of meat whole. Because of the way their teeth are, they were nicknamed “shark-toothed lizards”.
Each tooth was roughly 12 inches long. If that wasn’t scary enough, that measurement came from a rather small Carcharodontosaurus that measured only 13 feet. This means some specimens may have had even larger teeth.
2. Archaeornithomimus
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The next dinosaur has 18 letters in its name. This is Archaeornithomimus. It means “ancient bird mimic”. This is because it was a theropod, which had feathers and hollow bones just like modern birds do.
This species was found in areas like China and Mongolia. It is from the late Cretaceous period. This dinosaur measured about five feet tall, eight feet long, and weighed 200 pounds.
Archaeornithomimus traveled in packs of other Archaeornithomimus, as well as other dinosaur species. They’ve been found to have a lot of power in their legs. This might have made them fast enough to run away from most predators that lived in the area. It also might have made them agile hunters themselves.
Though they primarily ate plants, some evidence suggests that they also ate small mammals and insects when the opportunity arose. They had clawed fingers spaced widely apart to allow for easy capturing of prey.
3. Pachycephalosaurus
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Dinosaur number four is the Pachycephalosaurus. Technically, it fits anywhere on the list between third and sixth place, as all three dinosaurs have 18 letters in their names.
You may notice that this dinosaur shares almost the same name as the dinosaur first on our list, Micropachycephalosaurus. That’s because the paleontologist that first found Micropachycephalosaurus thought they were related to Pachycephalosaurus but smaller.
So they just slapped the micro- prefix on the front and called it good. While scientists are now pretty sure they aren’t related, the name has stuck.
The Pachycephalosaurus is a dinosaur with a large and thick skull that is a dome-like shape at the top of its skull. It’s thought that their skulls were so thick because the species engage in head-butting competitions for mates, food, or space.
The tough skulls may have also helped to protect them from predators as a sort of defense weapon. With the skill measuring up to 10 inches in thickness, a well-placed hit could do some damage.
When head-butting a predator didn’t work, the species could run on all fours. Their powerful back legs added a burst of speed and propulsion when running.
These dinosaurs were found in the US, specifically around the area of Montana. The first example of this species was found in the 1830s. There haven’t been many other remains than skulls of this species discovered, so a lot of information about these dinosaurs is little more than guesswork.
There are two other species, the Stygimoloch and Dracorex, which were thought to be their own species. Further research has suggested that they might just be juveniles of the Pachycephalosaurus.
If this were true, it would change up a lot of what we know about the Pachycephalosaurus. For example, the species was thought to be herbivorous, but if these other dinosaurs are just the junior versions, they are more omnivorous.
4. Eustreptospondylus
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This is another dinosaur with an 18-letter name. Eustreptospondylus means “true well-curved vertebrae”. It was first found very close to Oxford in the UK.
This dinosaur weighed around 1,000 pounds and measured 15 feet long. This dinosaur was a theropod, which puts it in the same group as Archaeornithomimus. It had some major differences from Eustreptospondylus.
For one, Eustreptospondylus was a much larger dinosaur. It was also solely a carnivore. It’s from a different period as well. It came from the mid-Jurassic era, roughly 165 million years ago.
Some scientists argue that Eustreptospondylus and Magnosaurus are the same dinosaurs.
This is because they share similar hip structures and teeth. However, there are still enough differences that most scientists still think they are different.
There is still a lot unknown about this species. Only two sets of remains have ever been found. The holotype was lost and the second one lacks a lot of the key features of Eustreptospondylus, leading scientists to hypothesize it’s the same species, but a juvenile version.
The lack of fossil evidence for this dinosaur coupled with the lack of popularity means that not much research has been done and therefore not much is known about this species. Even the group they’re in is argued about.
The standard theory right now is that Eustreptospondylus fits into the Theropod clade. This seems to be accurate without much argument there. However, when it comes to family, there’s a lot more uncertainty.
Currently, the species seems to be part of the Megalosauridae family, but there were arguments to make it into its own Eustreptospondylidae family. Some people even put it in the Stegosauridae family alongside Triceratops and Stegosaurus.
5. Opisthocoelicaudia
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Opisthocoelicaudia is the last of the dinosaurs with 18 letters in their name. This dinosaur was found in Mongolia and is missing a few key parts, including the skull and neck. With this dinosaur being considered a long-neck dinosaur, missing the key components is pretty bad and leaves a lot unknown.
What scientists are pretty sure of is that Opisthocoelicaudia is an herbivore and that it lived in the late Cretaceous period. It also belongs to the sauropod group, along with other long-neck dinosaurs.
An interesting fact about this dinosaur species is that it has a long and sturdy tail. This tail acted as a tripod so Opisthocoelicaudia could stand on its back legs to reach food higher up in trees than it could normally.
It’s estimated to measure around 39 feet, but that’s again just an estimation with the neck and skull missing. There is another dinosaur species known as Nemegtosaurus that is only known from a partial skull.
Some scientists theorize that the skull is actually from an Opisthocoelicaudia. This would mean that Opisthocoelicaudia is just a junior version of the Nemegtosaurus.
6. Panamericansaurus
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The next group of dinosaurs all have 17 letters in their name. This one, the Panamericansaurus, has a name that comes from the group that funded the work. The Pan American Energy Co. funded the work of the group that found the dinosaur. In return, they named their find after the company.
This is another long-neck dinosaur. It’s closely related to titanosaurs like Aeolosaurus, Pitekunsaurus, and Gondwanatitan. They found this dinosaur in South America and it’s believed to have lived in the Cretaceous period.
Not much is known about this dinosaur, except what scientists theorize based on similar species. It is likely an herbivore and tends to stay on land. It measured just over 50 feet in height and weighed over 26,000 pounds.
7. Brachylophosaurus
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Brachylophosaurus was first found in 1936 and described in 1953. The fossil was found near Alberta in the form of a skull and partial skeleton. However, it was found later that the actual first species was found in 1922 in the form of a partial skull.
Some other fossils have been found since then, most of them quite promising. For example, in 1994 a full and uncrushed skeleton was found and nicknamed “Elvis”. This provided a lot of information and was quite an exciting find.
That is, until 2000 when a mummified version of a Brachylophosaurus was found. It’s considered one of the most amazing dinosaur finds ever recorded.
Other digs have revealed remains of Brachylophosaurus since then, expanding knowledge about this species. It’s related to other duck-billed dinosaurs known as Hadrosaurs. They’ve been found in areas like Alberta, Canada, and Montana, US.
Most of this knowledge focused on the shape of the scales and the location of soft tissue on the body. They even found evidence of stomach parasites that lived in the species, and potentially other dinosaur species.
Brachylophosaurus has a bony crest over the back of the skull and down the spine. It measured 30 feet long and weighed around 15,000 pounds. They had hundreds of stacked teeth perfect for grinding through plants.
