Triceratops horridus

Marsh, 1889
1912-20 MNHN.F.AMN168
Dinosauria, Ornithischia, Marginocephalia, Ceratopsidae
Upper Cretaceous, Maastrichtian, 66 million years ago
Lance Creek Wyoming, USA

Triceratops, whose name means “three-horned head”, is the most famous of the ceratopsians, a group of horned dinosaurs known from Asia and North America.

Its skull bears a pronounced bony collar that protects the neck and shoulders. It may have used its horns to defend itself from carnivorous dinosaurs such as Tyrannosaurus rex. 
The rest of this skeleton – the legs, rib cage, vertebral column and tail – was not preserved. From its beak to the tip of its tail, Triceratops measured up to 9 m in length.

The last representatives of the dinosaurs, Triceratops lived up until the advent of the great catastrophe that marks the end of the Cretaceous period and the demise of the great dinosaurs. Birds are the only dinosaurs to have survived the Cretaceous-Tertiary extinction event.

Purchased in 1912 from Ch. Sternberg.