The biggest dinosaur - who is he? When people began to dig up dinosaur bones (and this first happened a very, very long time ago) legends of giant dragons arose. The Hellenes considered these bones the remains of their heroes - participants in the siege of Ilion. After the rise of Christianity, it became fashionable to consider them the skeletons of animals that did not survive the Flood. And the Chinese even attributed healing properties to them.
Everything changed in the nineteenth century, when it was proved that these bones are the remains of
prehistoric animals. The first dinosaur described was a megalosaurus - one of the carnivorous dinosaurs that lived 180 million years ago. And although the name “megalosaurus” translates as a huge lizard, later the remains of animals were found that were many times larger than its size.
The dimensions of the “most-of-itself” of the dinosaurs increased with each new find. The largest dinosaur, as one would expect, was the representative of the “herbivorous fraction” of the ancient dinosaurs. But the brontosaurus, to which at the end of the nineteenth century passed the "passing banner" of the largest lizard, did not bask in the rays of glory for long. A few decades later, new discoveries were made that changed mankind's ideas about antediluvian animals.
What is the situation today?
The title "largest dinosaur" now belongs to the lizard with the difficult name of Bruhatkayosaurus. His bones were found in 1995 in India. However, the “bones” are not entirely true. Bruhatkayosaurus was described by a single bone - the tibia. Lately, the skeletons of large dinosaurs are practically not found, they are reconstructed from the few fragments found. For example, another contender for the title "largest dinosaur" - amphicelia - was described not even by a whole bone, but by a fragment (!) Of a vertebra. How, based on the fragment, scientists were able to establish the height, weight and length of an ancient animal - a big question. But, obviously, such techniques exist, with a small margin of error, otherwise the "restored" dinosaurs would not be included in the list of ancient animals. We rely on the opinion of professionals in this matter.
So, for the current year 2013, who can be awarded the title of "largest dinosaur"? The first challenger is Bruhatkayosaurus. This giant weighed (according to the most orthodox hypothesis) up to 240 tons, and had a length of up to 44 meters. The second is amphicelia with a maximum estimated mass of 155 tons and a length of up to 62 meters. In comparison with the "champion" - a kind of slender goner: long, but light. Relatively, of course ...
The third place and a bronze medal are given to the representative of South America (however, at that time, it seems, it has not yet separated from the general mainland massif) Argentinosaurus. It had a length of up to 35 meters and a mass of up to 108 tons. The fourth place was taken by the zavroposeidon, which had a length of 31 meters and a mass of 60 tons. It is noteworthy in that, unlike most other large herbivorous dinosaurs, it held its neck not parallel to the ground, but extended upward. Thanks to which, he could easily look into the window of the fifth floor of a modern house. And even the sixth. And finally, the top five closes the super-salmon. The length of 34 meters and a mass of 40 tons make it quite small against the background of more massive winners.
As for carnivorous dinosaurs, the largest carnivorous dinosaur, according to the unanimous opinion of scientists, is a giantotosaurus with a height of 7 meters and a mass of 13 tons. Why are the largest dinosaurs, representatives of predators and herbivores, so different in size? The fact is that for normal life, predators need to eat a large amount of meat food. And with large dimensions and mass, they need to devour a huge number of animals to maintain life. If predators were the size of a bruhatkayosaurus, they would have to destroy all herbivores, and then die by themselves. From hunger.