Carnotaurus was a carnivore (meat-eater) that lived in South America (its fossils have been found in Patagonia, Argentina) during the late Cretaceous period, about 70 million years ago. Carnotaurus was about 30 feet (9 meters) long, and stood about 10 feet (3 meters) tall at the hips. It weighed around 2 tons. The most noteworthy feature of Carnotaurus are the thick horns above the eyes, it is from these it gets its name, which means “flesh bull” (it is a meat-eater, and the horns are said to resemble those of a bull). Although only one near-complete skeleton of Carnotaurus has been so far (at the time of writing this article), this skeleton was accompanied by fossilized skin impressions. From these, we know that Carnotaurus did not have feathers (unlike some other advanced theropod dinosaurs), but the animals skin was lined with rows of bumps, the bumps growing larger nearer the animal’s spine. It is not entirely clear what the purpose of these bumps would have been.
