New Dino-book highlights Britain’s ‘Three-rex’

02 Jul 2014

How our country was a “dinosaur paradise”

Jurassic Britain was a “dinosaur paradise” with more than 100 different species – including three tyrannosaurs – described in the scientific literature to date, says the author of a new book, Dinosaurs of the British Isles.

But despite this diverse Dino-heritage, palaeontologist Dean Lomax, a visiting scientist at the School of Earth, Atmospheric and Environmental Sciences, claims the UK’s rich reptilian past has been somewhat neglected by the popular media and literature… until now.

“The term Dinosauria, meaning ‘terrible lizard’, was conceived by the British palaeontologist Sir Richard Owen almost 200 years ago for fossils found in England,” says 24-year-old Lomax. “Sadly, when most people are asked to name a dinosaur, the chances are they would give a foreign example, such as Tyrannosaurus rex, even though the British Isles was a veritable dinosaur paradise.”

Most dinosaurs have been discovered in England – the majority around Oxfordshire and on the Isle of Wight – but some significant finds have also been made in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. The first ever dinosaur to be described was Megalosaurus, which was discovered in Oxfordshire and described in 1824.

‘Dinosaurs of the British Isles’, co-authored by Physicist and talented artist Nobumichi Tamura, is more than 400 pages long and contains 800 plus images, including photographs of the actual fossils and scene reconstructions depicting how the animals may have appeared in life.

Lomax added: “I had long hoped for such a book. Growing up in Yorkshire I had always wanted to learn about the dinosaurs discovered here, yet all of the books I read, or programmes I watched on TV, made only passing comments to some of the remains discovered in the British Isles.

“The book covers every major dinosaur discovery in this country and lists all the locations where the remains have been found and are currently stored, including one-of-a-kind species.

“I hope the book, which has involved collaboration with more than 40 institutions worldwide, will inspire and encourage a new wave of future palaeontologists with a real passion for British dinosaurs.”

• ‘Dinosaurs of the British Isles’, by Dean Lomax and Nobumichi Tamura, is published by Siri Scientific Press, Manchester, and is available directly from the publisher: http://www.siriscientificpress.co.uk. ISBN 978-0-9574530-5-0 (publication date 30 June 2014), 416 pp.