Crossword clues for jurassic
jurassic
The Collaborative International Dictionary
Jurassic \Ju*ras"sic\, a. (Geol.) Of the age of the middle Mesozoic, about 190 to 140 million years ago, including, as divided in England and Europe, the Lias, O["o]lite, and Wealden; -- named from certain rocks of the Jura mountains. It was noted for the predominance of dinosaurs on land, and the development of the first birds and mammals. -- n. The Jurassic period or formation; -- called also the Jura.
Douglas Harper's Etymology Dictionary
in reference to "geological period between the Triassic and the Cretaceous," 1847, from French Jurassique, literally "of the Jura Mountains," between France and Switzerland, whose limestones were laid down during this geological period. Used in English in a literal sense "pertaining to the Jura Mountains" by 1831. The name is said to be from Gaulish *iuris "wooded mountain."
Wikipedia
The Jurassic (; from Jura Mountains) is a geologic period and system that extends from 201.3 Mya (million years ago) to 145.5 Mya; from the end of the Triassic to the beginning of the Cretaceous. The Jurassic constitutes the middle period of the Mesozoic Era, also known as the Age of Reptiles. The start of the period is marked by the major Triassic–Jurassic extinction event. Two other extinction events occurred during the period: the Pliensbachian/Toarcian event in the Early Jurassic, and the Tithonian event at the end; however, neither event ranks among the "Big Five" mass extinctions.
The Jurassic is named after the Jura Mountains within the European Alps, where limestone strata from the period were first identified. By the beginning of the Jurassic, the supercontinent Pangaea had begun rifting into two landmasses, Laurasia to the north and Gondwana to the south. This created more coastlines and shifted the continental climate from dry to humid, and many of the arid deserts of the Triassic were replaced by lush rainforests. On land, the fauna transitioned from the Triassic fauna, dominated by both dinosauromorph and crocodylomorph archosaurs, to one dominated by dinosaurs alone. The first birds also appeared during the Jurassic, having evolved from a branch of theropod dinosaurs. Other major events include the appearance of the earliest lizards, and the evolution of therian mammals, including primitive placentals. Crocodilians made the transition from a terrestrial to an aquatic mode of life. The oceans were inhabited by marine reptiles such as ichthyosaurs and plesiosaurs, while pterosaurs were the dominant flying vertebrates.
Usage examples of "jurassic".
The 30-foot carnivore named Afrovenator abattensis was related to the fierce predator Allosaurus that had lived 30 million years before in the Jurassic of North America.
Oviraptor, a therapod relative of the Cretaceous Tyrannosaurus rex and the Jurassic predator Allosaurus, but about the size of a small ostrich.
A herd of those Jurassic Park brachiosaurs could have waded by, completely at home.
Fish, sharks, coelacanths, a few squirrel-sized mammals, and lungfish were also common in freshwater terrestrial habitats, especially in the Late Jurassic when the effects of aridity were ameliorated.
Triassic and Early Jurassic herrerasaurs and ceratosaurs were replaced by carnosaurian allosaurids and different small coelurosaurian theropods.
By the end of the Jurassic, sauropods, the grandest of all the dinosaur groups, were, in terms of abundance, the most significant vertebrates within these terrestrial ecosystems.
Empty platforms rushed past, their names in title: Cambrian, Ordovician, Silurian, Devonian, Permian, Triassic, Jurassic.
Purga was born, an ornitholestes stalked through the dense Jurassic forest, hunting diplodocus.
Early and Middle Jurassic dinosaurs were widespread, but their remains generally occur as isolated skeletons rather than in concentrations in deposits where analysis of habitat and rock deposition can be combined for paleoecologic interpretations.
I know that there are others where the reptilia of the Triassic and Jurassic Ages of the outer crust reign in undisputed possession because no other creature dare enter their domain.
There were two or three other varieties of Trachodon that I could see, and a few smaller dinosaurs, with a massive bulk in what passed for the distance that might have been a brontosaurus hangover from the Jurassic of a few million years before.
Traversodonts continued to survive nearly to the end of the Triassic, with the tritylodonts persisting into the Middle Jurassic as the last surviving therapsids.
Jurassic, angiosperms had spread very slowly, but after the extinctions at the end of that period, there was time for flowering plants to get going before the next batch of hungry herbivores took over.
When a truck passes, it cleaves the wind with a cry that seems strangely Jurassic.
Malformed specimens of Crinoids are known from the Triassic and Jurassic deposits.