Dinosaurs were the dominant vertebrate animals for over 160 million years, from approximately 230 million years ago until about 65 million years ago, when most of them became extinct. The 10,000 living species of birds have been classified as dinosaurs. The term "dinosaur" was coined in 1842 by Sir Richard Owen and derives from the Greek deinos "terrible, powerful, wondrous" + sauros "lizard."

This article uses material from the Wikipedia article "Dinosaur" and is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License.