the.com/velociraptor
the turkey-sized assassin Hollywood inflated into a six-foot nightmare with marketing
means A small, feathered, fast-running predatory dinosaur of the Late Cretaceous, known for the large sickle-shaped claw on each foot.
from From Latin 'velox' (swift) plus 'raptor' (robber, plunderer — the same root behind 'rapacious' and 'rape' in its older sense of seizure). The name was coined in 1924 by paleontologist Henry Fairfield Osborn for a fossil found in Mongolia: literally the 'swift thief.' The Latin stayed dignified; the marketing department did the rest.
- actual size
- About as tall as a medium dog
- feathered
- Covered in feathers, not scales
- wrist quills
- Fossil bumps prove attached feathers
- famous claw
- Likely held prey, not slashed it
- name meaning
- Latin for swift thief
deinonychus — montana dinosaur from 110 million years ago, the actual inspiration for jurassic park's 'velociraptors'
utahraptor — utah raptor from 125 million years ago, largest dromaeosaur at 23 feet long
microraptor — chinese fossil from 120 million years ago, four-winged dinosaur with feathers