When Was The First Dinosaur Born?

When was the first dinosaur born?

Paleontologists found dinosaurs appeared in about the late Triassic, 150 million years later than the reptiles appeared.

This kind of animal is rare at first, but finally became the lord of the world during the Jurassic period.

Researches about dinosaur fossils show us—all dinosaurs have a common ancestor. In fact, it is a kind of reptile called—Archosauria.

Archosauria

The Archosauria not only ancestor of dinosaurs but also evolved to birds, crocodiles, Pterosaur.

Archosauria further evolved to Proterosuchus which is closer to dinosaurs. The picture below will tell you the evolution process from Archosauria to dinosaurs.

The first is crawling Archosauria, second is some smaller and lighter Archosauria (Lagosuchus e.g.), third is the first bipedal dinosaurs. 4th—Herrerasaurus, 5th—Eoraptor.

Herrerasaurus is one of the first dinosaurs. It got the name because its first fossil is found by an Argentina farmer named Herrera.

Herrerasaurus

Compare the Proterosuchus, Herrerasaurus has iconic anatomical features of dinosaurs.

Proterosuchus and Herrerasaurus skeleton

1991, the Fossils of Eoraptor was found at the same place that discovered Herrerasaurus. Eoraptor lived about 228 million years ago. It was about 1 meter (3-4ft) in length and more original than Herrerasaurus. Eoraptor was thought as the first carnivorous dinosaur we found, it’s name means “dawn plunderer”.

Eoraptor

1999, some paleontologists found two kinds of dinosaur fossils that earlier than Eorapter’s (230 million years ago). Their jawbone fossils proved they are herbivorous, we call them Prosauropoda. The Plateosaurus is a representative of them.