Marine reptile
Elasmosaurus
Its extremely long neck is one of its most recognizable features.
Elasmosaurus’ extraordinarily long neck was at the center of one of paleontology’s most famous mistakes.
Three stages. One companion.
Game artwork
AI-generated, stylized game illustrations. These designs and growth stages are imaginative, not scientific reconstructions.
Elasmosaurus at a glance
- Diet
- Carnivore
- It is interpreted as a consumer of other animals. Hunting and scavenging are not mutually exclusive behaviors.
- When it lived
- Cretaceous
- Group
- Elasmosauridae
- Elasmosaurids
- Fossil locations
- Kansas
- Places where fossils have been found
Beyond the game
The real Elasmosaurus
The first specimen was found in Kansas in 1867. An initial reconstruction placed the head at the wrong end of the body, a famous mistake in the history of paleontology.
Its extremely long neck is one of its most recognizable features. The head ended up being placed on the wrong end of a reconstruction. Correcting the assembly required recognizing the vertebrae and distinguishing the neck from the tail.
This grouping describes evolutionary relationships. Its members share ancestors; they do not form a chain in which one must turn into another.
Fossil discoveries
Selected fossil records · present-day map
Map references
Map: Natural Earth, public domain. Fossil records: linked collections and publications.A note on the science
Its extremely long neck is one of its most recognizable features. The head ended up being placed on the wrong end of a reconstruction. Correcting the assembly required recognizing the vertebrae and distinguishing the neck from the tail.
Sources & text credits
Explore the references behind this profile.
- Elasmosaurus
Wikipedia contributors · Spanish source
Educational text adapted and translated from this article by Wikipedia contributors. The revision link, when captured in the source catalogue, identifies the source version.
- Elasmosaurus
Wikipedia contributors · English source
Educational text adapted and translated from this article by Wikipedia contributors. The revision link, when captured in the source catalogue, identifies the source version.
- Elasmosauridae
Wikipedia contributors · English source
Educational text adapted and translated from this article by Wikipedia contributors. The revision link, when captured in the source catalogue, identifies the source version.
- Reptiles · extinct branch
Wikipedia contributors · English source
Educational text adapted and translated from this article by Wikipedia contributors. The revision link, when captured in the source catalogue, identifies the source version.
Educational text adapted in English from the existing Wikipedia-backed Dinosgacha catalogue and linked articles by Wikipedia contributors.
Existing English translations have been selected and arranged for this encyclopedia. Repeated period and diet text is omitted where those fields already carry it. Unknown facts remain unfilled; unreviewed geological age phrases are omitted and period labels replace numerical ages.
The adapted educational text is available under CC BY-SA 4.0. This text license does not apply to the game illustrations.