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Palaeontological atlas
Life’s history, written in stone
Explore dinosaurs through fossils, anatomy, measurements and the evidence behind each scientific reconstruction.
Field notes
New articles
Explore the collections
12 prehistoric life catalogues
From Cambrian seas and the first tetrapods to mammoths, pterosaurs and extinct birds.
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Ancient mammals
Ice-age animals
Marine reptiles
Pterosaurs
Ancient fish
Extinct birds
Ancient crocodylomorphs
Ancient arthropods
Cambrian animals
Ancient amphibians
Ancient lizards and snakes
Other fossil reptiles
Ancient mammalsFrom the earliest beasts to giants of the recent past
62 profiles→ 02Ice-age animalsMammoths, cave predators and cold grasslands
43 profiles→ 03Marine reptilesIchthyosaurs, plesiosaurs and other rulers of the sea
72 profiles→ 04PterosaursFrom small flyers to giants with aircraft-sized wingspans
100 profiles→ 05Ancient fishArmoured giants, early sharks and relatives of land vertebrates
100 profiles→ 06Extinct birdsFlying predators, island giants and flightless birds
100 profiles→ 07Ancient crocodylomorphsLand runners, river hunters and marine forms
100 profiles→ 08Ancient arthropodsTrilobites, sea scorpions and giants of ancient forests
100 profiles→ 09Cambrian animalsStrange body plans from early marine ecosystems
22 profiles→ 10Ancient amphibiansEarly tetrapods and giant aquatic predators
100 profiles→ 11Ancient lizards and snakesFrom Jurassic lizards to large marine squamates
87 profiles→ 12Other fossil reptilesEarly archosaurs and reptiles that were not dinosaurs
28 profiles→Start with the evidence
Compare dinosaur scale, examine landmark fossils and see how palaeontologists separate direct measurements from reconstruction.
Late Cretaceous
Tyrannosaurus rex
A bone-crushing bite, rapid adolescent growth and a fossil record that can test old assumptions.
Read the profile → Late CretaceousVelociraptor
A small feathered predator from the Gobi Desert, not the human-sized movie animal.
Read the profile → Interactive guideSize comparison
Turn metres and tonnes into buses, elephants and people while keeping the uncertainty visible.
Open the comparison →Earth chronology
A journey through geological time
Follow life from the first complex ecosystems to the modern world, or place a numerical age with the geological time calculator.
Palaeozoic538.8–251.902 million years agoMarine ecosystems diversified, vertebrates moved onto land and the first forests spread.Open the era →
Triassic and Jurassic251.902–143.1 million years agoDinosaurs arose, giant lineages spread, feathers evolved and the first birds appeared.Open the era →
Cretaceous Period143.1–66 million years agoDinosaur faunas, flowering plants and complex terrestrial communities transformed together.Open the period →
Cenozoic66 million years ago–presentMammals and birds diversified as climates cooled and the modern world took shape.Open the era →
How to read the site
A fossil is evidence. A living animal is a reconstruction.
Palaeontology joins incomplete bones, geological context and comparisons with living animals. Our guide to how fossils form explains why that evidence is always selective, while the guides to holotypes and doubtful scientific names show how one specimen controls the use of a name. Strong conclusions use several independent lines of evidence, while details such as colour, sound and social behaviour often remain much less certain.
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Start with the specimen
Which bones, tracks or traces were actually found?
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Name the method
Length and mass depend on reconstruction and modelling choices.
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Keep the range
A defensible interval is usually more useful than a dramatic single number.
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Mark the unknowns
Missing evidence is not permission to fill gaps with certainty.