Plants, animals, living things, etc. have complicated Latin names, assigned to them traditionally and for no other special purpose. When you think about it, Latin is dead, dinosaurs are dead, so, for them, it’s appropriate to use these tongue-twisters. When curiosity drives you to into a seemingly useless task of deciphering names of ancient lizards, you may find yourself surprised by the lack of complication and even amused by the banality of denominations.

Allosaurus or different lizard, due to extremely light spinal bones, no other dinosaur had

Ankylosaurus or fused lizard, due to connected armored plates on the back

Apatosaurus or deceptive lizard, due to the fact that its bones were often confused with other dinosaurs’ bones

Brachiosaurus or arm lizard, due to very very long forelegs (much longer than its hind legs)

Brachylophosaurus or short-crested lizard, due to small crest

Deinonychus or terrible claw, due to the large, sickle-like claw

Diplodocus or double-beamed lizard, due to an inverted “T” (double beam) vertebral projections of the midsection of its
tail

Iguanodon or iguana tooth, due to very similar teeth to those of an iguana

Maiasaura peeblesorum or good mother lizard, due to long nurture of its young

Oviraptor philoceratops or egg thief, due to eating stolen (ceratopsians’) eggs

Stegosaurus or roofed lizard, due to bony back plates

Triceratops or three-horned face, due to nose horn and two long brow horns

Troodon formosus or wounding tooth, due to curved, sharp, serrated teeth

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