![PikiWiki Israel 8174 dinosaur in rishon lezion](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/83/PikiWiki_Israel_8174_dinosaur_in_rishon_lezion.jpg)
Cultural depictions of dinosaurs have been numerous since the word ''
dinosaur
Dinosaurs are a diverse group of reptiles of the clade Dinosauria. They first appeared during the Triassic period, between 243 and 233.23 million years ago (mya), although the exact origin and timing of the evolution of dinosaurs is t ...
'' was coined in 1842. The non-avian dinosaurs featured in books, films, television programs, artwork, and other media have been used for both education and entertainment. The depictions range from the realistic, as in the television
documentaries
A documentary film or documentary is a non-fictional motion-picture intended to "document reality, primarily for the purposes of instruction, education or maintaining a historical record". Bill Nichols has characterized the documentary in term ...
of the 1990s and first decade of the 21st century, or the fantastic, as in the
monster movie
A monster movie, monster film, creature feature or giant monster film is a film that focuses on one or more characters struggling to survive attacks by one or more antagonistic monsters, often abnormally large ones. The film may also fall under ...
s of the 1950s and 1960s.
The growth in interest in dinosaurs since the
Dinosaur Renaissance has been accompanied by depictions made by artists working with ideas at the forefront of dinosaur science, presenting lively dinosaurs and
feathered dinosaur
A feathered dinosaur is any species of dinosaur possessing feathers. While this includes all species of birds, there is a hypothesis that many, if not all non-avian dinosaur species also possessed feathers in some shape or form.
It has been su ...
s as these concepts were first being considered. Cultural depictions of dinosaurs have been an important means of translating scientific discoveries to the public.
Cultural depictions have also created or reinforced misconceptions about dinosaurs and other prehistoric animals, such as inaccurately and anachronistically portraying a sort of "prehistoric world" where many kinds of extinct animals (from the
Permian
The Permian ( ) is a geologic period and System (stratigraphy), stratigraphic system which spans 47 million years from the end of the Carboniferous Period million years ago (Mya), to the beginning of the Triassic Period 251.9 Mya. It is the last ...
animal ''
Dimetrodon'' to
mammoth
A mammoth is any species of the extinct elephantid genus ''Mammuthus'', one of the many genera that make up the order of trunked mammals called proboscideans. The various species of mammoth were commonly equipped with long, curved tusks an ...
s and
cavemen
The caveman is a stock character representative of primitive humans in the Paleolithic. The popularization of the type dates to the early 20th century, when Neanderthals were influentially described as "simian" or " ape-like" by Marcellin Bo ...
) lived together, and dinosaurs lived lives of constant combat. Other misconceptions reinforced by cultural depictions came from a scientific consensus that has now been overturned, such as dinosaurs being slow and unintelligent, or the use of ''dinosaur'' to describe something that is maladapted or obsolete.
Depictions are necessarily conjectural, because
petrification
In geology, petrifaction or petrification () is the process by which organic material becomes a fossil through the replacement of the original material and the filling of the original pore spaces with minerals. Petrified wood typifies this proce ...
and other
fossil
A fossil (from Classical Latin , ) is any preserved remains, impression, or trace of any once-living thing from a past geological age. Examples include bones, shells, exoskeletons, stone imprints of animals or microbes, objects preserved ...
ization mechanisms do not preserve all details. Any reconstruction is thereby an artist's view that, in order to stay within the limits of the best knowledge at the time, must necessarily be inspired by other pictures already scientifically proved.
History of depictions
Early human history to 1900: Early depictions
![Protoceratops-skeleton](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/04/Protoceratops-skeleton.jpg)
The classical
folklorist Adrienne Mayor
Adrienne Mayor (born 1946) is a historian of ancient science and a classical folklorist.
Mayor specializes in ancient history and the study of "folk science", or how pre-scientific cultures interpreted data about the natural world, and how these ...
has proposed that the profusion of literary descriptions and imagery of the
griffin in Greek and Roman literature and art beginning in the 7th century BC to the 3rd century AD were influenced by observations and travelers' accounts of fossilized beaked dinosaur skeletons found in the Turpan and Junggar basins and
Gobi Desert. She noted that according to Aristeas, Sophocles, Herodotus, and other ancient writers, griffins were said to inhabit and lay eggs in nests on the ground in the lands beyond the Issedonian territory of the Altai region. Tales of these griffins traveled from east to west along the silk routes. Mayor draws connections to ''
Protoceratops
''Protoceratops'' (; ) is a genus of small protoceratopsid dinosaurs that lived in Asia during the Late Cretaceous, around 75 to 71 million years ago. The genus ''Protoceratops'' includes two species: ''P. andrewsi'' and the larger ''P. hellenik ...
'', a
frilled dinosaur and Psittacosaur fossils and dinosaur nests with eggs conspicuous in the Gobi,
sharing features associated with griffins: sharp beaks, four legs, claws, similar size, large eyes (or eye sockets in the case of the fossils), and the neck frill of ''Protoceratops'', with large open holes, argued as inspiring descriptions of the griffin's large ears or wings.
The palaeontologist Mark Witton notes in his blog that Mayor's suggestion ignores pre-
Mycenaean accounts, and has not found favour with archaeologists including N. Wyatt and T.F. Tartaron. Many Near Eastern and Minoan artworks feature imaginary composite creatures, including quadrupeds with birds' heads but these were not called "griffins" and no writings link them to strange beasts of Central Asia. There are no pre-Mycenaean or Minoan texts to relate bird-headed quadrupeds with classical griffins.
![Hopi snake dance, 5-15-26 LCCN2016842086](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/70/Hopi_snake_dance%2C_5-15-26_LCCN2016842086.jpg)
According to Mayor,
Navajos
The Navajo (; British English: Navaho; nv, Diné or ') are a Native American people of the Southwestern United States.
With more than 399,494 enrolled tribal members , the Navajo Nation is the largest federally recognized tribe in the United ...
used to hold ceremonies and make offerings to
dinosaur tracks
A trace fossil, also known as an ichnofossil (; from el, ἴχνος ''ikhnos'' "trace, track"), is a fossil record of biological activity but not the preserved remains of the plant or animal itself. Trace fossils contrast with body fossils ...
in Arizona.
Tridactyl
In biology, dactyly is the arrangement of digits (fingers and toes) on the hands, feet, or sometimes wings of a tetrapod animal. It comes from the Greek word δακτυλος (''dáktylos'') = "finger".
Sometimes the ending "-dactylia" is use ...
tracks were also featured as decorations on the costumes and
rock art of the
Hopi and
Zuni, probably influenced by such dinosaur tracks.
The scientific study of dinosaurs began in 1820s England. In 1842,
Richard Owen coined the term ''dinosaur'', which in his vision were elephantine
reptiles. An ambitious promoter of his discoveries and theories, Owen was the driving force for the
Crystal Palace dinosaur sculptures, the first large-scale public dinosaur reconstructions (1854). These sculptures, which can still be seen today, immortalized a very early stage in the perception of dinosaurs.
[Torrens, Hugh. "Politics and Paleontology". ''The Complete Dinosaur,'' 175–190.]
![London - Crystal Palace - Victorian Dinosaurs 1](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/c6/London_-_Crystal_Palace_-_Victorian_Dinosaurs_1.jpg)
The Crystal Palace sculptures were successful enough that
Benjamin Waterhouse Hawkins
Benjamin Waterhouse Hawkins (8 February 1807 – 27 January 1894) was an English sculptor and natural history artist renowned for his work on the life-size models of dinosaurs in the Crystal Palace Park in south London. The models, accurately ...
, Owen's collaborator, sold models of his sculptures
and planned a second exhibition,
Paleozoic Museum
Following the success of Benjamin Waterhouse Hawkins' life-sized concrete dinosaur models created for England's Crystal Palace for the Great Exhibition of 1851, in 1868 the Commissioners of Manhattan's newly created Central Park recruited the scu ...
, for
Central Park
Central Park is an urban park in New York City located between the Upper West and Upper East Sides of Manhattan. It is the fifth-largest park in the city, covering . It is the most visited urban park in the United States, with an estimated ...
in
Manhattan
Manhattan (), known regionally as the City, is the most densely populated and geographically smallest of the five boroughs of New York City. The borough is also coextensive with New York County, one of the original counties of the U.S. state ...
in the late 1860s; it was never completed due to the interference of local politics and "Boss"
William Marcy Tweed.
In the same period, dinosaurs first appeared in popular literature, with a passing mention of an Owen-style ''
Megalosaurus
''Megalosaurus'' (meaning "great lizard", from Greek , ', meaning 'big', 'tall' or 'great' and , ', meaning 'lizard') is an extinct genus of large carnivorous theropod dinosaurs of the Middle Jurassic period (Bathonian stage, 166 million years ...
'' in
Charles Dickens
Charles John Huffam Dickens (; 7 February 1812 – 9 June 1870) was an English writer and social critic. He created some of the world's best-known fictional characters and is regarded by many as the greatest novelist of the Victorian e ...
's ''
Bleak House
''Bleak House'' is a novel by Charles Dickens, first published as a 20-episode serial between March 1852 and September 1853. The novel has many characters and several sub-plots, and is told partly by the novel's heroine, Esther Summerson, and ...
'' (1852–1853).
["''London. Michaelmas term lately over, and the Lord Chancellor sitting in Lincoln's Inn Hall. Implacable November weather. As much mud in the streets, as if the waters had but newly retired from the face of the earth, and it would not be wonderful to meet a Megalosaurus, forty feet long or so, waddling like an elephantine lizard up Holborne Hill.''" From page 1 of Dickens, Charles J.H. (1852). '' Bleak House, Chapter I: In Chancery''. London: Bradbury & Evans.] However, depictions of dinosaurs were rare in the 19th century, possibly due to incomplete knowledge. Despite the well-publicized "
Bone Wars
The Bone Wars, also known as the Great Dinosaur Rush, was a period of intense and ruthlessly competitive fossil hunting and discovery during the Gilded Age of American history, marked by a heated rivalry between Edward Drinker Cope (of the Ac ...
" of the late 19th century between the American palaeontologists
Edward Drinker Cope and
Othniel Charles Marsh
Othniel Charles Marsh (October 29, 1831 – March 18, 1899) was an American professor of Paleontology in Yale College and President of the National Academy of Sciences. He was one of the preeminent scientists in the field of paleontology. Among ...
, dinosaurs were not yet ingrained in culture. Marsh, although a pioneer of skeletal reconstructions, did not support putting mounted skeletons on display, and derided the Crystal Palace sculptures.
[Dodson, Peter. ''The Horned Dinosaurs,'' 74–75.]
1900 to the 1930s: New media
![Laelaps-Charles Knight-1897](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/8f/Laelaps-Charles_Knight-1897.jpg)
As study caught up to the wealth of new material from western North America, and venues for depictions proliferated, dinosaurs gained in popularity. The paintings of
Charles R. Knight
Charles Robert Knight (October 21, 1874 – April 15, 1953) was an American wildlife and paleoartist best known for his detailed paintings of dinosaurs and other prehistoric animals. His works have been reproduced in many books and are currently ...
were the first influential representations of these finds. Knight worked extensively with the
American Museum of Natural History and its director,
Henry Fairfield Osborn
Henry Fairfield Osborn, Sr. (August 8, 1857 – November 6, 1935) was an American paleontologist, geologist and eugenics advocate. He was the president of the American Museum of Natural History for 25 years and a cofounder of the American Euge ...
, who wanted to use dinosaurs and other prehistoric animals to promote his museum
and his ideas on evolution.
Knight's work, found in museums around the United States, helped popularize dinosaurs and influenced generations of
paleoartists. His early work showing fighting "Laelaps" (=''
Dryptosaurus
''Dryptosaurus'' ( ) is a genus of tyrannosauroid that lived approximately 67 million years ago (mya) during the latter part of the Cretaceous period, New Jersey. ''Dryptosaurus'' was a large, bipedal, ground-dwelling carnivore, that grow up to ...
'') depicted dinosaurs as much more lively than they would be presented for much of the 20th century.
At the same time, improvements in casting allowed dinosaur skeletons to be reproduced and shipped across the world for display in far-flung museums, bringing them to the attention of a wider audience; ''
Diplodocus
''Diplodocus'' (, , or ) was a genus of diplodocid sauropod dinosaurs, whose fossils were first discovered in 1877 by S. W. Williston. The generic name, coined by Othniel Charles Marsh in 1878, is a neo-Latin term derived from Greek δι ...
'' was the first such dinosaur reproduced in this way.
Dinosaurs began appearing in films soon after the introduction of cinema, the first being the good-natured
animated
Animation is a method by which still figures are manipulated to appear as moving images. In traditional animation, images are drawn or painted by hand on transparent celluloid sheets to be photographed and exhibited on film. Today, most ani ...
''
Gertie the Dinosaur
''Gertie the Dinosaur'' is a 1914 animated short film by American cartoonist and animator Winsor McCay. It is the earliest animated film to feature a dinosaur. McCay first used the film before live audiences as an interactive part of his vaude ...
'' in 1914.
However, lovable dinosaurs were quickly replaced as moviemakers recognized the thrill of huge frightening
monsters.
D. W. Griffith in 1914's ''
Brute Force'' provided the first example of a threatening cinematic dinosaur, a ''
Ceratosaurus
''Ceratosaurus'' (from Greek κέρας/κέρατος, ' meaning "horn" and σαῦρος ' meaning "lizard") was a carnivorous theropod dinosaur in the Late Jurassic period ( Kimmeridgian to Tithonian). The genus was first described in 1 ...
'' who menaced cavemen. This film enshrined the fiction that dinosaurs and early humans lived together, and set up the cliché that dinosaurs were bloodthirsty and attacked anything that moved.
The now-common trope of dinosaurs extant in isolated locations in today's world appeared at the same time, beginning with
Arthur Conan Doyle's ''
The Lost World'' (1912) and the works of
Edgar Rice Burroughs. ''The Lost World''
crossed into the movies in 1925, setting heights for
special effects
Special effects (often abbreviated as SFX, F/X or simply FX) are illusions or visual tricks used in the theatre, film, television, video game, amusement park and simulator industries to simulate the imagined events in a story or virtual wo ...
and attempts at scientific accuracy. It is unusual, even today, for attempting to portray dinosaurs as something other than monsters in constant combat.
The
stop-motion techniques of
Willis O'Brien
Willis Harold O'Brien (March 2, 1886 – November 8, 1962) was an American motion picture special effects and stop-motion animation pioneer, who according to ASIFA-Hollywood "was responsible for some of the best-known images in cinema history," ...
went on to bring dinosaurs to life in the 1933 film ''
King Kong
King Kong is a fictional giant monster resembling a gorilla, who has appeared in various media since 1933. He has been dubbed The Eighth Wonder of the World, a phrase commonly used within the franchise. His first appearance was in the novelizat ...
'', which merged the tropes of dinosaur combat and dinosaurs in a lost world.
His protégé
Ray Harryhausen
Raymond Frederick Harryhausen (June 29, 1920 – May 7, 2013) was an American-British animator and special effects creator who created a form of stop motion model animation known as "Dynamation". His works include the animation for '' Mi ...
would continue to refine this method, but most later dinosaurs movies until the advent of
CGI would eschew such expensive effects for cheaper methods, such as humans in dinosaur suits and modern reptiles with dinosaur decorations, enlarged by cinematography.
Dinosaur depictions diversified in the 1930s, spreading to newspaper
comic strips in ''
Alley Oop
''Alley Oop'' is a syndicated comic strip created December 5, 1932, by American cartoonist V. T. Hamlin, who wrote and drew the strip through four decades for Newspaper Enterprise Association. Hamlin introduced a cast of colorful characters an ...
''
and to advertising for
Sinclair Oil
Sinclair Oil Corporation was an American petroleum corporation, founded by Harry F. Sinclair on May 1, 1916, the Sinclair Oil and Refining Corporation combined, amalgamated, the assets of 11 small petroleum companies. Originally a New York cor ...
.
The 1930s to the 1970s: Moribund dinosaurs to renaissance
![Rhedosaurus & the lighthouse](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/70/Rhedosaurus_%26_the_lighthouse.png)
The
Great Depression and
World War II
World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposing ...
combined to sink the study of dinosaurs into a decades-long lull.
Scientists considered dinosaurs a group of unrelated animals
[Bakker, Robert T. ''The Dinosaur Heresies'', 447–449.] that left no descendants, and dinosaurs were presented as stupid, slow, stuck in swamps, and doomed to
extinction
Extinction is the termination of a kind of organism or of a group of kinds (taxon), usually a species. The moment of extinction is generally considered to be the death of the last individual of the species, although the capacity to breed and ...
.
[Bakker, Robert T. ''The Dinosaur Heresies'', 15–16.] Scientific dinosaur artwork, primarily from
Rudolph F. Zallinger and
Zdeněk Burian
Zdeněk Michael František Burian (11 February 1905 in Kopřivnice, Moravia, Austria-Hungary – 1 July 1981 in Prague, Czechoslovakia) was a Czech painter, book illustrator and palaeoartist whose work played a central role in the development of p ...
, reflected and reinforced the conception of dinosaurs as slow and static (one artistic quirk that became commonplace in representations of
Mesozoic
The Mesozoic Era ( ), also called the Age of Reptiles, the Age of Conifers, and colloquially as the Age of the Dinosaurs is the second-to-last era of Earth's geological history, lasting from about , comprising the Triassic, Jurassic and Cretace ...
landscapes, the presence of a
volcano
A volcano is a rupture in the Crust (geology), crust of a Planet#Planetary-mass objects, planetary-mass object, such as Earth, that allows hot lava, volcanic ash, and volcanic gas, gases to escape from a magma chamber below the surface.
On Ear ...
, was a hallmark of Zallinger's).
From such ideas came the
alternate use of "dinosaur" as something out of date.
[Definition of dinosaur]
Merriam-Webster's Online Dictionary. Accessed 26 May 2007.
Films of the time typically used dinosaurs as monsters, with the added element of atomic fears in the early
Cold War. Thus, ''
The Beast from 20,000 Fathoms
''The Beast from 20,000 Fathoms'' is a 1953 American science fiction monster film directed by Eugène Lourié, with special effects by Ray Harryhausen. The film stars Paul Christian, Paula Raymond, Cecil Kellaway, and Kenneth Tobey. The screen ...
'' (1953) and ''
Godzilla
is a fictional monster, or '' kaiju'', originating from a series of Japanese films. The character first appeared in the 1954 film '' Godzilla'' and became a worldwide pop culture icon, appearing in various media, including 32 films prod ...
'' (Japanese release 1954; American release 1956 as ''
Godzilla, King of the Monsters!
is a 1956 ''kaiju'' film directed by Terry O. Morse and Ishirō Honda. It is a heavily re-edited American localization, commonly referred to as an "Americanization", of the 1954 Japanese film ''Godzilla (1954 film), Godzilla''. The film was a ...
'') portray monstrous dinosaur-like prehistoric reptiles that go on rampages after being awakened by
atomic bomb tests.
An alternative appears in
Disney
The Walt Disney Company, commonly known as Disney (), is an American multinational mass media and entertainment conglomerate headquartered at the Walt Disney Studios complex in Burbank, California. Disney was originally founded on October ...
's animated ''
Fantasia'' (1940) in its ''
The Rite of Spring
, image = Roerich Rite of Spring.jpg
, image_size = 350px
, caption = Concept design for act 1, part of Nicholas Roerich's designs for Diaghilev's 1913 production of '
, composer = Igor Stravinsky
, based_on ...
'' sequence, which attempted to portray dinosaurs with some scientific accuracy (although it has the common error of showing prehistoric animals from many different time periods living at the same time)
and also in
Karel Zeman
Karel Zeman (3 November 1910 – 5 April 1989) was a Czech film director, artist, production designer and animator, best known for directing fantasy films combining live-action footage with animation. Because of his creative use of special effec ...
's ''
Cesta do praveku'' (1955; ''Journey to the Beginning of Time''), a Czechoslovakian children's science fiction movie inspired by Zdeněk Burian's work.
![Fred Wierum Deinonychus](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/0f/Fred_Wierum_Deinonychus.png)
In 1956,
Oliver Butterworth authored a children's book, ''The Enormous Egg''. The book and a movie adaptation televised in 1968 by the
NBC Children's Theatre
''NBC Children's Theatre'' is an American television anthology series airing from November 3, 1963 to March 17, 1973. Its stories were primarily drawn from classical and contemporary children's literature, including The Merry Adventures of Robin ...
tell the story of a boy who finds an enormous egg laid by a hen that hatches a baby ''
Triceratops
''Triceratops'' ( ; ) is a genus of herbivorous chasmosaurine ceratopsid dinosaur that first appeared during the late Maastrichtian stage of the Late Cretaceous period, about 68 million years ago in what is now North America. It is one ...
''. The dinosaur, named ''
Uncle Beazley'', becomes too big, so the boy brings him to the
Smithsonian Institution
The Smithsonian Institution ( ), or simply the Smithsonian, is a group of museums and education and research centers, the largest such complex in the world, created by the U.S. government "for the increase and diffusion of knowledge". Founded ...
in
Washington, D.C.
)
, image_skyline =
, image_caption = Clockwise from top left: the Washington Monument and Lincoln Memorial on the National Mall, United States Capitol, Logan Circle, Jefferson Memorial, White House, Adams Morgan, ...
Beazley is first kept at the
National Museum of Natural History
The National Museum of Natural History is a natural history museum administered by the Smithsonian Institution, located on the National Mall in Washington, D.C., United States. It has free admission and is open 364 days a year. In 2021, with 7 ...
, but is eventually transferred to the
National Zoo's Elephant House because there is a law against stabling large animals in the District of Columbia. In the later part of the book, Uncle Beazley must be saved from a narrow-minded Senator who wants it destroyed. (Senator
Joseph McCarthy was at the peak of his career at the time of writing.)
Dinosaurs gained a home in
television
Television, sometimes shortened to TV, is a telecommunication medium for transmitting moving images and sound. The term can refer to a television set, or the medium of television transmission. Television is a mass medium for advertisin ...
in the 1960s animated
sitcom
A sitcom, a portmanteau of situation comedy, or situational comedy, is a genre of comedy centered on a fixed set of characters who mostly carry over from episode to episode. Sitcoms can be contrasted with sketch comedy, where a troupe may use ...
''
The Flintstones
''The Flintstones'' is an American animated sitcom produced by Hanna-Barbera Productions. The series takes place in a romanticized Stone Age setting and follows the activities of the titular family, the Flintstones, and their next-door neighb ...
'', in another example of dinosaurs shown as coexisting with humans (for comedic effect in this case).
Dinosaurs also entered
comic book
A comic book, also called comicbook, comic magazine or (in the United Kingdom and Ireland) simply comic, is a publication that consists of comics art in the form of sequential juxtaposed panels that represent individual scenes. Panels are of ...
s in this period in such series as ''
Tor
Tor, TOR or ToR may refer to:
Places
* Tor, Pallars, a village in Spain
* Tor, former name of Sloviansk, Ukraine, a city
* Mount Tor, Tasmania, Australia, an extinct volcano
* Tor Bay, Devon, England
* Tor River, Western New Guinea, Indonesia
Sc ...
'' and ''
Turok, Son of Stone'', where prehistoric humans fought anachronistic dinosaurs. For those wanting more scientific accounts of dinosaurs, there were the first nontechnical dinosaur books.
Ned Colbert's ''The Dinosaur Book'' (1945) was the first such book, and its status as the only such book for many years made Colbert an important figure for the coming generations of paleontologists and dinosaur enthusiasts.
In the 1960s, paleontologist
John Ostrom
John Harold Ostrom (February 18, 1928 – July 16, 2005) was an American paleontologist who revolutionized modern understanding of dinosaurs in the 1960s.
As first proposed by Thomas Henry Huxley in the 1860s, Ostrom showed that dinosaurs were ...
began work on the
theropod
Theropoda (; ), whose members are known as theropods, is a dinosaur clade that is characterized by hollow bones and three toes and claws on each limb. Theropods are generally classed as a group of saurischian dinosaurs. They were ancestrally c ...
''
Deinonychus
''Deinonychus'' ( ; ) is a genus of dromaeosaurid theropod dinosaur with one described species, ''Deinonychus antirrhopus''. This species, which could grow up to long, lived during the early Cretaceous Period, about 115–108 million y ...
''.
His findings, which were expanded upon by his student
Robert T. Bakker, contributed to the
Dinosaur Renaissance, a
revolution
In political science, a revolution (Latin: ''revolutio'', "a turn around") is a fundamental and relatively sudden change in political power and political organization which occurs when the population revolts against the government, typically due ...
in the study of dinosaurs. Of particular importance were a reevaluation of the
origin of birds
The scientific question of within which larger group of animals birds evolved has traditionally been called the "origin of birds". The present scientific consensus is that birds are a group of maniraptoran theropod dinosaurs that originated ...
that showed them to be closely related to
coelurosauria
Coelurosauria (; from Greek, meaning "hollow tailed lizards") is the clade containing all theropod dinosaurs more closely related to birds than to carnosaurs.
Coelurosauria is a subgroup of theropod dinosaurs that includes compsognathids, t ...
n dinosaurs,
reappraisal of
dinosaur physiology that suggested they were not the sluggish
cold-blooded animals that they had long been assumed to be, and a recognition that dinosaurs formed a natural group.
Soon thereafter came new evidence on dinosaur social behavior, with nests of ''
Maiasaura
''Maiasaura'' (from the Greek ''μαῖα'', meaning "good mother" and ''σαύρα'', the feminine form of ''saurus'', meaning "reptile") is a large herbivorous saurolophine hadrosaurid ("duck-billed") dinosaur genus that lived in the area cur ...
'' suggesting parental care.
These findings were reflected in the work of a new generation of paleoartists. One milestone was Sarah Landry's
feathered dinosaur
A feathered dinosaur is any species of dinosaur possessing feathers. While this includes all species of birds, there is a hypothesis that many, if not all non-avian dinosaur species also possessed feathers in some shape or form.
It has been su ...
in Bakker's 1975 ''
Scientific American
''Scientific American'', informally abbreviated ''SciAm'' or sometimes ''SA'', is an American popular science magazine. Many famous scientists, including Albert Einstein and Nikola Tesla, have contributed articles to it. In print since 1845, it ...
'' article, ''Dinosaur Renaissance''.
Louis Paul Jonas
Louis Paul Jonas (July 17, 1894 – February 16, 1971) was an American sculptor of wildlife, taxidermist, and natural history exhibit designer.
Born in Budapest, Hungary, Jonas moved to the United States at the age of 12 and went to work at ...
created the first full sized dinosaur sculptures for the
1964 New York World's Fair in the "Dinoland" area, which was sponsored by the
Sinclair Oil Corporation, whose
logo
A logo (abbreviation of logotype; ) is a graphic mark, emblem, or symbol used to aid and promote public identification and recognition. It may be of an abstract or figurative design or include the text of the name it represents as in a wo ...
featured a dinosaur. Jonas consulted with paleontologists
Barnum Brown,
Edwin H. Colbert and John Ostrom in order to create nine sculptures that were as accurate as possible. After the Fair closed, the dinosaur models toured the country on flatbed trailers as part of a company advertising campaign. Most of the statues are now on display at various museums and parks.
![Uncle Beazley - Paint job - Stierch](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/6/68/Uncle_Beazley_-_Paint_job_-_Stierch.jpg)
In 1967, the Sinclair Oil Corporation gave one of its dinosaurs, a fiberglass model of a ''Triceratops'', to the Smithsonian Institution. The model, which appeared in ''The Enormous Egg'' television movie in 1968 as ''Uncle Beazley'', is now on display at the National Zoo in
Washington, D.C.
)
, image_skyline =
, image_caption = Clockwise from top left: the Washington Monument and Lincoln Memorial on the National Mall, United States Capitol, Logan Circle, Jefferson Memorial, White House, Adams Morgan, ...
From the 1970s to 1994, the statue was located on the
National Mall in front of the National Museum of Natural History (some sources state that the
Kentucky Science Center
The Kentucky Science Center, previously known as the Louisville Museum of Natural History & Science and then Louisville Science Center, is Kentucky's largest science museum. Located in Louisville, Kentucky, on "Museum Row" in the West Main Dist ...
in
Louisville
Louisville ( , , ) is the largest city in the Commonwealth of Kentucky and the 28th most-populous city in the United States. Louisville is the historical seat and, since 2003, the nominal seat of Jefferson County, on the Indiana border.
...
(formerly named the "Louisville Museum of Natural History and Science" and the "Louisville Science Center") now owns the ''Triceratops'' model).
[
]
The 1980s to the present: Dinosaurs reconsidered
The reevaluation of dinosaurs spurred public interest, with the new generation of paleoartists quick to respond. Artists such as Mark Hallett, Doug Henderson, John Gurche, Gregory S. Paul
Gregory Scott Paul (born December 24, 1954) is an American freelance researcher, author and illustrator who works in paleontology, and more recently has examined sociology and theology. He is best known for his work and research on theropod dino ...
, William Stout
William Stout (born September 18, 1949) is an American fantasy artist and illustrator with a specialization in paleontological art. His paintings have been shown in over seventy exhibitions, including twelve one-man shows. He has worked on over ...
, and Bob Walters illustrated the new findings in response to the demand.
By the latter half of the 1980s and into the 1990s, other media were showing the influence of the increased popularity, with diverse depictions aimed at a variety of ages and interests.
In 1990 the Smithsonian Institution's National Museum of Natural History in Washington, D.C., featured an exhibition of dinosaur sculpture by Jim Gary
Jim Gary (March 17, 1939 – January 14, 2006) was an American sculptor popularly known for his large, colorful creations of dinosaurs made from discarded automobile parts. These sculptures were typically finished with automobile paint altho ...
that drew more visitors than any of its previous exhibits. His ''Twentieth Century Dinosaurs'', popular since the 1960s, began being featured in textbooks, encyclopedias, and videos as well as later, by the likes of National Geographic, in their publications for children in 1975, and they featured Gary as the cover story for National Geographic World
''National Geographic Kids'' (often nicknamed to ''Nat Geo Kids'') is a children's magazine published by the National Geographic Society. Its first issue was printed in September 1975 under the original title ''National Geographic World'' (whic ...
in September 1978.
For preschoolers, there was the educational television show ''Barney & Friends
''Barney & Friends'' is an American children's television series targeted at young children aged 2–7, created by Sheryl Leach. The series premiered on PBS on April 6, 1992. The series features the title character Barney, a purple anthropomo ...
'' starting in 1992; their older siblings had the 1988 animated movie ''The Land Before Time
''The Land Before Time'' is an American animated film series and media franchise created by Judy Freudberg and Tony Geiss, distributed by Universal Pictures and centered on dinosaurs. The series began in 1988 with the eponymous '' The Land Bef ...
'' and its increasing line of direct to video
Direct-to-video or straight-to-video refers to the release of a film, TV series, short or special to the public immediately on home video formats rather than an initial theatrical release or television premiere. This distribution strategy was p ...
sequel
A sequel is a work of literature, film, theatre, television, music or video game that continues the story of, or expands upon, some earlier work. In the common context of a narrative work of fiction, a sequel portrays events set in the same ...
s (13 by 2016). Dinosaucers
''Dinosaucers'' is a 1987 animated television series co-produced in the United States and Canada, produced by DIC Animation City and distributed in syndication in the US by Coca-Cola Telecommunications. The show was created by producer Michael ...
was a cartoon television show from the 1980s. '' Dinosaurs'', a television sitcom, parodied humans and other television shows. Of particular note is Michael Crichton's 1990 novel, '' Jurassic Park'', the popularity of which led to a series of films and other related media. The first of these, '' Jurassic Park'', married advanced CGI with advances in scientific knowledge of dinosaurs. The 2000 Disney
The Walt Disney Company, commonly known as Disney (), is an American multinational mass media and entertainment conglomerate headquartered at the Walt Disney Studios complex in Burbank, California. Disney was originally founded on October ...
animated
Animation is a method by which still figures are manipulated to appear as moving images. In traditional animation, images are drawn or painted by hand on transparent celluloid sheets to be photographed and exhibited on film. Today, most ani ...
film ''Dinosaur
Dinosaurs are a diverse group of reptiles of the clade Dinosauria. They first appeared during the Triassic period, between 243 and 233.23 million years ago (mya), although the exact origin and timing of the evolution of dinosaurs is t ...
'' was the most expensive movie in 2000, but was a box-office success, as were other films such as the 2009 animated film '' Ice Age 3: Dawn of the Dinosaurs'', the 2012 film '' The Dino King'', the 2013 film '' Walking with Dinosaurs: The Movie'' and the 2015 Disney/Pixar
Pixar Animation Studios (commonly known as Pixar () and stylized as P I X A R) is an American computer animation studio known for its critically and commercially successful computer animated feature films. It is based in Emeryville, Californ ...
animated film ''The Good Dinosaur
''The Good Dinosaur'' is a 2015 American computer-animated adventure film produced by Pixar Animation Studios and distributed by Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures. The film was directed by Peter Sohn (in his feature directorial debut) an ...
''. The falling cost of computer-generated effects also has recently allowed the increased production of documentaries for television; the award-winning 1999 BBC #REDIRECT BBC #REDIRECT BBC
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...
are notable examples. There are numerous theme parks and rides dedicated to dinosaurs including
committee to encode three pictures of heads of three dinosaur species considered exemplary as
.
. Typical errors include: prehistoric humans living with dinosaurs; dinosaurs as monsters that did little else but fight;
the portrayal of a kind of "prehistoric world" where all prehistoric animals are shown to exist;
dinosaurs as all large; dinosaurs as stupid and slow-moving; dinosaurs as being
s) as dinosaurs.
Moreover, dinosaurs did not become extinct due to being generally maladapted or unable to cope with normal climatic change, a view found in many older textbooks.
Reports in the news media of dinosaur finds and dinosaur science are often inaccurate and sensationalistic, and popular dinosaur books usually lag scientific understanding.
s and models are often inaccurate, packaged indiscriminately with other prehistoric animals,
'' toys.
The pejorative use of "dinosaur" as something behind the times has been applied to people, styles, and ideas that are perceived to be out of date and on the wane.
" bands that preceded them as "dinosaur bands".
However, some popular depictors have striven for accuracy and presented up-to-date information; Michael Crichton
are two recent examples. Paleoartists and illustrators in particular have kept up with research. Popular conceptions of dinosaurs have also been important in stimulating the interest and imagination of young people, and have been responsible for introducing many who would later become paleontologists to the field. In addition, popular depictions have the freedom to be more imaginative and speculative than technical works.
The typical use of dinosaurs in popular culture has been as vicious monsters.
There are several distinct genres of dinosaur depictions commonly used: "lost worlds" on modern Earth;
and dinosaurs running amok in the modern world.
The appeal of dinosaurs, as suggested by author, researcher, and dinosaur enthusiast
, has multiple factors. Dinosaurs were "monsters," yet are safely extinct, allowing for vicarious thrills. They appeal to the imagination, and there are many ways to approach them intellectually. Finally, they appeal to adults nostalgic for what they enjoyed as children. Children have been particularly drawn to dinosaurs over the years.
The scientific discoveries of dinosaurs sometimes led to creation of local museums with positive impact on the local society and economy. Some of the best examples are the dinosaurs from
, in Portugal famous for the dinosaur eggs. Found in the Upper Jurassic outcrops of Lourinhã, Portugal, and first published in 1997, the Paimogo dinosaur egg clutch is one of Portugal's most remarkable fossils, with over one hundred eggs preserved in association with embryonic bones, of the allosauroid theropod ''
''. However, many questions about it have remained unanswered, even until the present day. After its discovery, this extraordinary fossil became the keystone of a small local museum, greatly kick-starting regional tourism, while also holding the fossils in trust for future generations to study. More than 20 years later, continually sustained paleontological interest from the public has even given rise to both a highly successful dinosaur theme park in the region and an aspiring UNESCO Geopark.
*Allen A. Debus, Diane E. Debus, "Paleoimagery: The Evolution of Dinosaurs in Art", 2002
*Allen A. Debus, "Dinosaurs in Fantastic Fiction: A Thematic Survey", , 2006
*Zoë Lescaze (Editor), "Paläo-Art", Taschen, , 2017
*Alexis Dworsky "Dionsaurier! Die Kulturgeschichte", , 2011 (German, English summary)