Dilophosaurus was shown in movies with a neck frill like a frilled lizard and portrayed as spitting venom. However, there is no proof that real Dilophosaurus had a frill or venom glands.

A Navajo man named Jesse Williams discovered the first partial Dilophosaurus skeletons in Arizona, USA. Samuel Welles first thought the fossils were a new species of Megalosaurus, but after finding a fossil with unique head crests, he named it Dilophosaurus, the first meat-eating dinosaur identified with skull crests.

In 2001, more Dilophosaurus specimens were found, showing new parts of the skeleton.

Dilophosaurus was a meat-eating dinosaur from North America. Its name means ‘two-crested lizard,’ which comes from the double crests on its head.

Nobody is certain what the crests were for. The most likely theories are that the dinosaur used them to identify other Dilophosaurus or to attract a mate.

The crests probably weren’t strong enough to have any use in combat.

More tomorrow.