OBJECT DOSSIER · SMITHSONIAN OPEN ACCESS

Herbivorous reptile — Trilophosaurus buettneri

SAGE Museum Deep Time scientific dossier

Artist / Creator

Daderot

Date / Period

Late Triassic — Norian to possibly Rhaetian · Late Triassic.

Object Type

composite

Medium

unknown_needs_review

About This Object

Geologic period: Late Triassic — Norian to possibly Rhaetian

Age: Late Triassic.

Feeding: Primarily herbivorous. Broad multi-cusped teeth and strong jaw musculature were suited to processing tough vegetation.

Locomotion: Terrestrial quadruped; some skeletal features have been interpreted as compatible with climbing ability.

Body plan: Robust archosauromorph with a deep skull, strong jaws and distinctive transversely broad teeth.

Evidence: Skull structure and tooth morphology are direct evidence. Diet is strongly inferred from dental form and functional studies.

Why it matters: Trilophosaurus demonstrates that Triassic herbivores experimented with specialized feeding systems very different from those of later dinosaur herbivores.

Plain Language Identity: A specialized Late Triassic trilophosaurid archosauromorph with broad multi-cusped teeth.

What You Are Looking At: A composite skeletal display representing Trilophosaurus buettneri.

Ecosystem: Late Triassic terrestrial ecosystems of the American Southwest.

Preservation: Composite museum mount.

Find Location: Smithsonian material includes fossils from Texas.

Open Questions: Potential climbing or arboreal behavior should remain an anatomical hypothesis rather than a certainty.

Source Urls: https://naturalhistory.si.edu/visit/virtual-tour/current-exhibits/deep-time-virtual-tour-fossil-list; https://www.si.edu/object/trilophosaurus-buettneri-case-1928:nmnhpaleobiology_3448971; https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC10031418/

Enrichment Method: SAGE curated research pass; title and scientific name matched; chronology and lineage distinctions retained; evidence separated from inference

Scientific name: Trilophosaurus buettneri

Evidence / representation: comparative_taxon_visual

Why It Is In This SAGE Exhibit

comparative_taxon_visual

Rise of the Dinosaurs: A New World After Catastrophe.

Provenance

Smithsonian Deep Time source scene: Reptiles Move Back to the Ocean in the Jurassic

Visual source institution: Wikimedia Commons

Exhibition History

Included in the SAGE Museum Dinosaurs & Deep Time staging exhibit.

Collection & Credit

Media license: CC0

http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/deed.en

Subjects & Themes

Trilophosaurus buettneri Late Triassic — Norian to possibly Rhaetian composite Reptiles Move Back to the Ocean in the Jurassic Rise of the Dinosaurs

ORIGINAL COLLECTION SOURCE

This object page stays inside SAGE Museum. The Smithsonian link below is provided only as the original scholarly collection record. It opens separately.

VIEW ORIGINAL SMITHSONIAN RECORD ↗