# Triceratops (Triceratops horridus) — DinoLand

> Field Journal — free dinosaur encyclopedia: 33 species with photos and video, catalog, ancient world maps (Triassic, Jurassic, Cretaceous, Gondwana), quiz, and paleontology glossary.

### id=2: Triceratops (Triceratops horridus)

- URL: https://www.dinoland.ai/species.html?lang=en&id=2
- Diet: Herbivore
- Era: Cretaceous
- Period: 68–66 million years ago
- Length: 9 m
- Weight: ≈6–12 t
- Height: 3 m
- Speed: до 30 km/h
- Habitat: Open woodlands, floodplains, and prairies
- Region: North America
- Discovered: 1877, Othniel Charles Marsh

Fact: “Three horns and a bony frill—display, defense, and thermoregulation.”

Description: Triceratops is the classic chasmosaurine ceratopsian of the latest Cretaceous. Its expansive parietosquamosal frill and three facial horns likely functioned in species recognition, social signaling, and protection from predators; the frill may also have played a role in heat exchange. A narrow rostral beak and batteries of ever-replacing cheek teeth supported efficient cropping and shearing of low-growing cycads, ferns, and flowering plants across coastal lowlands.

Features:
  - The bony frill can exceed ~1 m in transverse breadth in large adults
  - Hundreds of stacked cheek teeth formed a continuous cutting battery for fibrous plants
  - Healed bite marks on frills and ribs document antagonistic encounters with tyrannosaurids

Related genera: Torosaurus, Nasutoceratops, Centrosaurus


## Citation

Field Journal — Dinosaur Encyclopedia — https://www.dinoland.ai

Web: https://www.dinoland.ai/species.html?lang=en&id=2
Index: https://www.dinoland.ai/llms-en.txt