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INTRODUCTION
Planet Earth is filled with a dazzling diversity of life, but few animals can compete with the extinct dinosaurs for variety, size, and sheer magnificence. They roamed the earth away back in the ancient past and came in an incredible range of shapes and sizes.
Some of these ancient creatures had enormous bodies and were the most colossal creatures ever to have lived on land, while others were only the size of chickens. Some were fierce and had sharp claws and razor teeth, while others were harmless and docile.
Many of them had spikes, horns, and plates and were the weirdest animals ever to walk on earth. Some were agile and could run very fast, while others were ponderous, slow-moving and awkward. Dinosaurs lived on all seven continents, yes, even Antarctica.
But how much do we really know about these amazing creatures? How and where did they live? Why did they die out? And what do their fossil traces tell us? Join me on the ‘dinosaur trail’ as we search for answers. We’ll travel back in time and get up close and personal with the biggest, fastest, fiercest, and strangest creatures that ever roamed the earth.
DINOSAURS LARGE AND SMALL
Dinosaurs once roamed the Earth in large numbers, and though they’re now extinct, these creatures continue to captivate the imagination of people, young and old, around the world. And following them on the dinosaur trail takes us far and wide because dinosaurs roamed all over the world.
Evidence of their existence is found on every continent, from the America’s to Asia to Europe to Africa to Australia, and even Antarctica. They inhabited all the vegetation regions: jungles, grassland, tundra, desert and ice-sheet.
But what, exactly is a dinosaur? Well, to begin with, they’re reptiles. And these ancient reptiles lived on land, in contrast to other ancient reptiles like Plesiosaurs, that were water reptiles, and Pterosaurs, that were flying reptiles.
And the feature that distinguishes dinosaurs from these other reptiles is a hole in the hip socket, which allowed dinosaurs to walk upright with their limbs directly under their bodies. Pterosaurs and plesiosaurs did not have this feature and so were not dinosaurs, even though many lived at the same time as dinosaurs.
Dinosaurs had huge, long tails that didn’t touch the ground. They had scales. They laid eggs and built nests. So, all dinosaurs hatched from eggs. Although they had these features in common, Dinosaurs also had lots of differences that made each species unique, too.
There were over one thousand different species of dinosaurs, and they came in all kinds of shapes and sizes. Some weighed as much as 100 tons and were more than 37m or 120ft long. Others were the size of a small bird and weighed as little as 120g or 4 ounces.
Now, while scientists have complex ways of classifying dinosaurs, many people separate them into three groups: carnivores or meat eaters; herbivores or plant eaters; and omnivores that ate both meat and plants. But whatever their diet, dinosaurs were among the most awe-inspiring animals to have lived on Earth. Some of them were truly amazing!
AMAZING VARIETY
The tallest known dinosaur was Sauroposeidon, a herbivore that walked on four legs and grew up to 18m or 60ft tall, which is the same height as three giraffes standing on top of one another.
In contrast, one of the smallest dinosaurs ever found was Microraptor that was discovered in China and was about the size of a pigeon. It only weighed about 1kilo or 2 pounds and fed on insects.
One of the fastest dinosaurs was Galliminus which could run at a rate of over 70 kmh or 43mph – about as fast as a cheetah, the fastest land animal alive today.
The smartest, or most brainy dinosaur was the Troodon. It was a carnivore, a hunting dinosaur, about 2m, or 6ft 5in long and had a large brain for its body size. It was both smart and fast, as it could run almost as fast as a Galliminus.
One of the dumbest dinosaurs was Stegosaurus, that had a brain about the size of a walnut – only 3 centimetres or about an inch long and weighing 75 grams, or close to 3oz. Comparing brain size to body size, it certainly ranked as one of the least intelligent dinosaurs.
The world of dinosaurs was filled with threats and danger, and so it was important for them to be able to protect themselves. The dinosaur with the best armour was probably Ankylosaurus. These herbivores weighed about 5 tons and were up to 10m, or 33ft long, but couldn’t move much faster than a human could walk. They had super-tough plated skin covered with spikes, and a clubbed tail which helped in defence against hunters.
If a predator attacked, the low and heavy reptile would swing its tail, that was made up of seven bones fused together in a hard and heavy mass, like a club, with enough force to break the attacker’s bones.
Other dinosaurs had their own unique defence apparatus. The Triceratops for example had three impressive horns jutting out of its face and a huge solid, curved headplate or frill. It was probably the most spectacular horned dinosaur of all time.
Although it appeared dangerous, Triceratops was actually a slow-moving herbivore that used its beak like jaw and slicing teeth to pluck and chew plants. Like most of the bigger plant eaters it stood and walked on four legs. But it sure needed its horns and fierce appearance because it lived in Tyrannosaurus rex territory – and that’s not the kind of neighbour you want to have living nearby.
Tyrannosaurus rex, whose name means ‘king of the tyrant lizards’, but is popularly known today as T-rex, was probably the fiercest and most powerful land predator that has ever lived. It was a massively built killer three and a half metres or 12ft tall, 13m or 43ft long and weighing about 9 tons.
It had strong legs and thigh muscles for charging into attack with lethal speed. It had terrifying, long, bone-crushing teeth, powerful jaws, and eyesight as sharp as an eagle. Like all meat-eating dinosaurs T-rex stood and walked on two legs balanced by the weight of its long tail. It had tiny arms compared to the rest of its body, but they had strong muscles for gripping prey.
Like all dinosaurs T-rex laid eggs. They laid large clutches of elongated eggs, in nests on the ground that they incubated and cared for. They stayed with their eggs until they hatched, and then reared the young by bringing them food until they were old enough to travel with them. They often travelled in small groups of 4 or 5 adults.
They roamed through a wide variety of habitat but it was on the open plains and forested river valleys that the T-rex was most likely to find their favourite prey – a triceratops or it’s near relative and look alike, the Einiosaurus.
A wide variety of plant-eating dinosaur species frequented these areas, some on their own, others in small groups called packs, or in larger herds like the Orodomeus. But they were always alert and on the lookout for danger and their sentry quickly warned of the approaching danger.
There were also herds of the massive, long-necked Brontosaurus who roamed through the plains with their young on their way to the forested river valleys. While dinosaurs roamed the land, the skies were filled with Pterosaurs, flying reptiles, that also congregated on the rocky cliff face along the edge of the river valley. They were kings of the sky.
But it was on the plains and along the river valleys that the T-rex family focused their attention. They were the deadly enemy of so many animals, but in particular a voracious predator of Triceratops and the smaller, Einiosaurus.
Using their keen power of scent that could detect prey 6kms or 4miles away, the T-rex began to stalk their prey, a herd of Einiosaurus, who were peacefully grazing in an open field in the river valley.
But attacking a horned creature like an Einiosaurus was laced with danger as they were no soft target. They had vicious horns that were lethal weapons that could stab and severely wound, and they certainly knew how to use them. If the hunter puts a foot wrong, the next few minutes could be his last.
Just how the hunt ended we’ll never know. The age of the dinosaurs ended abruptly
when a huge cataclysm killed off the dinosaurs and resulted in a mass extinction. But thanks to modern science, we know a lot about the dinosaurs that used to roam Earth.
So, how do scientists know so much about dinosaurs today? I mean, they went extinct a long time ago. Nobody can see a dinosaur today. They can’t observe them in the wild like they do with modern animals. No. Instead, they rely upon what dinosaurs left behind – their bones [and] fossils.
FOSSILS AND PALEONTOLOGY
Scientists study dinosaurs’ bones and other bodily material left behind in fossil graveyards that have been discovered around the world, virtually on every continent.
These dinosaurs died suddenly and were engulfed and buried suddenly, their bodies quickly covered with mud or sand, and then more layers of sediment.
Under all these layers, the weight on top of the skeleton increases, causing great pressure. This creates the hard sedimentary rock in which the fossils are found. Over time, minerals in water seep through the rock into the bones.
The minerals turn the dinosaur’s bones into stone, into a fossil, preserving them. The various sediments in which the fossil is buried build up in flat layers like pancakes, to form the sedimentary layers which are preserved as rock strata and cover much of the earth’s surface.
Then eventually erosion of the accumulated layers takes place and wears the surrounding rock away and exposes the fossil. Then fossil hunters need to arrive at the right place at the right time to discover and unearth the fossil. That’s the process or cycle that brings ancient dinosaurs into contact with us today. Virtually everything we know about dinosaurs comes from studying these fossils.
No one knows when the first dinosaur bone was found. Ancient peoples most likely uncovered fossils of dinosaur bones from time to time, but they had no idea what they had found. Even early English and European scientists weren’t sure about the fossils they found.
For example, in 1676, Robert Plot, a curator of an English Museum, discovered a huge thigh bone in England. He believed it belonged to an ancient species of human ‘giants.’ Only many years later was it determined that it belonged to a dinosaur.
In 1824 William Buckland, a British fossil hunter and the first geology professor at Oxford University was the first person to correctly identify a dinosaur fossil for what it really was. He wrote the world’s first scientific description of a fossil dinosaur, which was named Megalosaurus in 1827.
At this time, the word ‘dinosaur’ hadn’t been invented yet. The word was first used by Richard Owen in 1842. He produced the term ‘dinosaur,’ from two Greek words which mean ‘terrible lizard,’ to describe these distinct creatures, which he recognised as significantly different from today’s reptiles.
Although the study of dinosaurs really got its start in 1842, there wasn’t much available to study. In fact, in 1860 just six types of dinosaurs were known. But then people started finding spectacular dinosaur bones in America.
In the 1870’s two dinosaur hunters, Edward Drinker Cope and Othniel Charles Marsh, started competing to find new fossils. This became known as the ‘bone wars.’ By 1892 they had discovered more than 120 new species of dinosaurs between them.
As the 1900’s began, many scientists and universities all over the world were inspired by the bone wars and these new discoveries. They began to study and research dinosaur fossils and so a whole new branch of the science known as palaeontology began.
Now, Palaeontology is the scientific study of fossils – the remains of long-dead dinosaurs and other creatures. And the people who specialise in this field are called Palaeontologists. They’re the detectives who examine the evidence that dinosaurs and other extinct animals left behind such as bones, teeth, footprints, tracks, eggs and skin impressions.
These fossil hunters gather and piece together the remains of these extinct creatures to give us a glimpse into the past and help us better understand life on earth. And what’s really exciting is that new fossil evidence is being found all the time. Virtually every day brings a new dinosaur discovery. There’s so much more out there to discover.
But, what have we learnt from what’s already here, from what we’ve already discovered? Well, we’ve seen that a wide variety, and many species of dinosaurs roamed widely across the world in large numbers.
We’ve also seen that even though they’re now extinct these ancient creatures continue to captivate the imagination of people young and old. But it’s not just present-day people who are fascinated by dinosaurs.
ANCIENT CIVILISATIONS AND DINOSAURS
Nearly all ancient civilisations had stories or art depicting giant reptiles and dinosaur-like creatures. Petroglyphs or rock carvings, artifacts, and even little clay figures found in North America resemble modern depictions of dinosaurs – like the Anasazi dinosaur petroglyph in Utah that looks strikingly like a Brontosaurus.
Then, there are rock carvings in South America that depict diplodocus-like creatures and, amazingly, bear the familiar images of many other well-known dinosaurs.
Then across in Europe, from the Roman Empire we have mosaics like the ‘Nile Mosaic from Palestrina’ the shows dinosaur-like creatures.
And in the Middle East the ancient Egyptians produced the ‘Narmer Palette’ thousands of years ago that depicts two dinosaur-like creatures with their long necks entwined. And it wasn’t unique – the ‘Two Dog Palette’ displays something similar.
Further east in Mesopotamia – present day Iraq – the walls of ancient Babylon, built around 600BC during the reign of King Nebuchadnezzar, depict rows of curious long-necked dinosaur-like dragons called sirrush. Today many scholars believe the sirrush image and description appear to best fit a sauropod dinosaur.
Across in Asia at Cambodia’s Angkor Wat, the largest temple complex in the world, is a 12th century Hindu temple complex that later became a Buddhist temple. On one of the temples, Ta Prohm, is a clear depiction of a living stegosaurus. The carving is a side view of the animal and shows a series of plates running down its back, in much the same way that we now know was present on the fossils of stegosaurus dinosaurs.
There are literally hundreds of these dinosaur-like depictions on the petroglyphs, artifacts, carvings, and art of ancient civilisations around the world. Many people wonder about the ancient Hebrews and ask if dinosaurs are mentioned in the Bible?
DINOSAURS AND THE BIBLE
Well, the word dinosaur isn’t found anywhere in the Bible. Now, that shouldn’t surprise us because ‘dinosaur’ is a relatively new word. Remember that it wasn’t until 1842 that Richard Owen even coined the word ‘dinosaur.’ And that was thousands of years after most of the Bible was written.
So, since the word ‘dinosaur’ didn’t even exist when the Bible was written, naturally you won’t find that word in the Bible. However, even though the term isn’t in the Bible, [that] doesn’t mean that the Bible does not refer to dinosaurs.
Now, imagine that you had to find a word to describe a huge dinosaur without actually using the term ‘dinosaur.’ What word would you use? How about ‘dragon’ or ‘monster.’ Well, those are the very words that the Bible writers chose.
The Bible uses the Hebrew word, ‘tanniyn’ to describe a mysterious creature resembling a giant reptile. This creature appears 28 times in the Hebrew scriptures or Old Testament, with English translations referring to it most often as a ‘dragon’ or a sea ‘monster.’ The term applies to a water monster as well as a land monster.
Many scholars believe that Bible writers used this term, ‘tanniyn’ to describe dinosaurs in the Bible. But those aren’t the only references to dinosaur-like creatures in the Bible. Dinosaurs seem to pop up through the book of Job, which many believe is the oldest book in the Bible – possibly written around three and a half thousand years ago.
Job 40 mentions a creature called a ‘Behemoth.’ And it provides a lot of information about the creature. Here are the details:
vs 15: It feeds on grass
vs 16: It has powerful hips
vs 16: It has powerful stomach muscles
vs 17: Its tail is like a cedar tree
vs 17: It has powerful thighs
vs 18: Its bones are like tubes of bronze
vs 18: Its limbs are like rods of iron
vs 19: It ranks first among God’s creation
Here the Bible describes a huge creature that Job has seen. It’s a grass eater that’s very strong, with great muscles. It moves its tail which is like a huge cedar tree. It’s the first, the chief, perhaps the largest and strongest of God’s creation. No present-day animal fits this description. But, a giant, plant-eating sauropod would – something like a Brachiosaurus or Apatosaurus.
Then a little further on Job 41 describes another huge fearsome creature – this time a sea creature, a sea monster. Again, details of the creature are mentioned:
vs 15: It has thick impenetrable scales on its back
vs 13: It has thick, tough skin like armour
vs 14: It has a huge mouth and strong jaw
vs 14: It has rows of fearsome sharp teeth
vs 15: On its back it’s got rows of plates or shields
vs 22: It has a long, strong neck
vs 24: It has a powerful chest as hard as a rock.
vs 30: It’s belly is protected by jagged plates or spikes
vs 33: It’s fearless
Certainly, no other creature, living or extinct, fits this description better than a dinosaur.
Now, dinosaurs were land creatures but remember there were also huge sea reptiles that lived around the same time as dinosaurs that are often grouped with them. They were some of the most fearsome predators that have ever existed.
One group were the Plesiosaurs – true sea monsters with massive, immensely strong jaws. And one of these huge water reptiles, such as a Liopleurodon, would certainly fit this description in the Bible book of Job. The Bible also mentions other dinosaur-like creatures in Genesis, Isaiah, and Psalms, as well.
Well, if the Bible does refer to Dinosaurs, where did they come from and what happened to them? Well, the Bible says that in the beginning God created all things, including this earth and everything in it. He accomplished His creation in just six days.
All of the land animals were created on day six along with the first people, Adam and Eve. This means that dinosaurs were created on the sixth day of creation, about 6,000 years ago. Now, how do we know that? Well, God gives us a comprehensive timeline right in the Bible itself.
In Genesis chapter 5 we see a list of Adam’s descendants up to Noah and how long they lived. Then we can follow more dates that the Bible gives us and measure to the time of Abraham, and on to Moses and the Exodus, King David, Solomon’s Temple, the Babylonian captivity, and on to Jesus.
From there, it easy to follow on down to our time, and we see that the earth is around 6,000 years old. The Bible provides a reliable timeline that provides a framework through which we can interpret and understand science and history.
The Bible tells us that the dinosaurs were originally plant-eaters like all the other creatures that God created. Here’s what it says in Genesis 1:30.
“And to all the beasts of the earth and all the birds in the sky and all the creatures that move along the ground – everything that has the breath of life in it – I give every green plant for food.” And it was so.
After Adam and Eve disobeyed God and ate from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, sin entered the world, and some animals became carnivores or omnivores including many of the dinosaurs. So, what happened to the dinosaurs?
Well, the Bible tells us that there was a great cataclysmic flood that largely destroyed all life on earth, and only Noah, his family, and the animals that he brought with him on to a large ship called the Ark, survived. Noah was commanded by God to bring two of every kind of creature on the ark. So, he would have brought dinosaurs as well.
Now, you’re probably wondering how Noah could possibly have squeezed all those animals, including large dinosaurs on a boat? Well, there are several important facts we need to remember. Firstly, God instructed Noah to build a massive ship that could hold not only the animals, but also all the food they needed, along with Noah and his family.
Secondly, Noah could have taken younger and much smaller dinosaurs on the ark, so that they would be able to mature and reproduce after the great flood. Thirdly, it’s not hard to conceive of dinosaurs being on the ark when we remember that the average size of a dinosaur was actually smaller than a cow.
AFTER THE FLOOD
So, what happened to the dinosaurs after the flood? How do we account for their extinction? Well, remember that most of them would have perished during the cataclysmic worldwide flood. And for those on the ark, the earth they disembarked on after the flood was very different from the one they knew before it. The flood devastated the earth and made it a much more difficult world to live in and survive.
Possibly they simply died out after the flood because their population never grew large enough in the post-flood world. There may have been major environmental change, making it more difficult to find the right types of food in sufficient quantities to sustain them. Quite simply, it was probably difficult for the dinosaurs to find enough food to survive.
Also, the great worldwide flood and all the water covering the earth’s surface would’ve changed the earth’s climate. And since the dinosaurs were reptiles, it could have been challenging for them to stay warm enough to live. And then, humans may have hunted dinosaurs to extinction for food, or sport, or self-defence.
The fact is, that no one knows for sure what happened to the dinosaurs, but we do know that dinosaurs aren’t the only animals to become extinct. Many animals over the years have died off due to all sorts of causes. Scientists tell us that thousands of species have gone extinct in the past century alone.
So, we don’t know for sure exactly when and why dinosaurs went extinct. But we do know that it wasn’t too long ago. Because now there’s archaeological and scientific evidence to demonstrate it.
Recently, eminent palaeontologists unexpectedly discovered red blood cells, soft tissue, and proteins in dinosaur fossils for the first time. These cells and soft tissue could not possibly have survived tens or hundreds of millions of years. These things simply don’t last that long. But they do clearly fit a biblical understanding of a creation only 6,000 years ago.
These new discoveries contradict the popular-held evolutionary timescale of tens and hundreds of millions of years, but provide immensely powerful support for the proposition that dinosaur fossils were mostly produced under catastrophic conditions a few thousand years ago, at most.
So, we see that the Biblical, scientific, archaeological, and historical evidence all combine to help us better understand dinosaurs and the world they lived in. Yes, dinosaurs were awesome creatures! Yet, the best thing about these incredible creatures is that they were created by our majestic and all-powerful God.
SPECIAL OFFER AND CLOSING PRAYER
If you’d like to know more about Dinosaurs and when and where they came from, then I’d like to recommend the free gift we have for all our Incredible Journey viewers today. It’s the booklet Dinosaurs and the Bible. This booklet is our gift to you and is absolutely free. I can assure you that there are no obligations whatsoever. So, make the most of this wonderful opportunity to receive the free gift we have for you today. Here’s the information you need:
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If you’ve enjoyed our journey along the dinosaur trail, and our reflections on when and where these awesome creatures came from, then be sure to join us again next week when we will share another of life’s journeys together. Until then, let’s pray to the great creator God who made these great creatures and us.
Dear Heavenly Father, and Creator God, thank you for the wonders of the natural world that you have provided for us, including the awesome dinosaurs of the past. They leave us in awe and wonder. They remind us that you are a powerful God, but they also tell us that you are a loving God who cares about us. Please grant us the inner-peace and happiness that comes from knowing that You are our Creator, and that you are in charge of our lives and that you will care for us. Please bless us now, we pray in Jesus’ name, Amen.
