Describer

Granger & Gregory, 1923

Time

Cretaceous Late ?Santonian Campanian

Classification

Ornithischia Genasauria Cerapoda Marginocephalia Ceratopia Neoceratopia Protoceratopidae

Diet

Herbivore

Fossilsite

Djadochta Formation, Beds of Toogreeg, ?Beds of Aleg Teg, Omnogov, Mongolia; Minhe Formation, Gansu; Nei Mongol Zizhiqu, China

Length

1,8 meter

Info

Genus - Typespecies - Skull - ?Eggs

Protoceratops andrewsi (Granger & Gregory, 1923) > Protoceratops hellenikorhinus (Lambert, Godefroit, Li, Shang, and Dong, 2001)

80 skulls, some skeletons juvenile to adult.

Protoceratops (\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\"first horned face\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\") was discovered by an American expedition to Mongolia in the early 1920s. The numerous skeletons belonged to four- legged plant-eaters with outsize heads, bony neck frills, sharp, shearing cheek teeth, and parrot- like beaks. Re-examining some of the dozens of Protoceratops fossil skulls, from hatchlings to old individuals led a Russian scientist in 1990 to re-identify two as belonging to a \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\"brand new\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\" genus Breviceratops, Protoceratops (and Breviceratops retain premaxillary teeth all other neoceratopians have lost them.