# Albertosaurus sarcophagus

> A lighter-built relative of T. rex from the Late Cretaceous of Alberta, Canada. A single bonebed at Dry Island held more than two dozen individuals of all ages, which made it one of the best-studied tyrannosaurs.

- Classification: Dinosauria (clade) > Saurischia (clade) > Theropoda (clade) > Coelurosauria (clade) > Tyrannosauroidea (superfamily) > Tyrannosauridae (family) > Albertosaurinae (subfamily) > Albertosaurus (genus) > Albertosaurus sarcophagus (species)
- Length: 8–9 m
- Hip height: 2.3–2.8 m
- Mass: 1.7–3 t
- Age: 72.1–66 million years ago (Late Cretaceous)
- Fossils found in: Horseshoe Canyon Formation (Alberta); Canada
- Diet: carnivore
- Described: Henry Fairfield Osborn, 1905

Canonical page: https://dinodex.club/dinosaurs/albertosaurus-sarcophagus
Last updated: 2026-09-27

## Overview

Albertosaurus sarcophagus lived in what is now Alberta about 70 million years ago, on the coastal plains and swamps of the Horseshoe Canyon Formation. Joseph Burr Tyrrell's Geological Survey of Canada party collected its first skull in 1884 on the Red Deer River, and Henry Fairfield Osborn named it in 1905.

It was a tyrannosaurid of about 8 to 9 m, lighter built than Tyrannosaurus, with longer lower legs and feet. Currie (2003) found that albertosaurines had slightly shorter, lower skulls and longer shins, metatarsals and toes than tyrannosaurines of the same size.

At Dry Island, found by Barnum Brown in 1910 and reopened by Philip Currie in 1997, a single bonebed held the remains of more than 20 individuals. Their growth rings allowed Erickson et al. (2006) to build a "life table": young Albertosaurus survived well, and mortality rose in mid-life.

## Name meaning

"Alberta lizard"; sarcophagus, Greek for "flesh-eater" (Osborn 1905).

## Sources

1. (2026). Paleobiology Database: Albertosaurus occurrences. The Paleobiology Database (paleobiodb.org), data service 1.2, accessed 2026-09-23. https://paleobiodb.org/data1.2/occs/list.txt?base_name=Albertosaurus&show=coords,paleoloc,strat,loc,ref&pgm=gplates
2. (2026). Wikipedia: Albertosaurus. Wikipedia (English), accessed 2026-09-23. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Albertosaurus
3. Cohen, K. M., Harper, D. A. T., Gibbard, P. L. & Car, N. (2023). International Chronostratigraphic Chart (v2023/09). International Commission on Stratigraphy. https://stratigraphy.org/ICSchart/ChronostratChart2023-09.pdf
4. Currie, P. J. (2003). Allometric growth in tyrannosaurids (Dinosauria: Theropoda) from the Upper Cretaceous of North America and Asia. Canadian Journal of Earth Sciences 40: 651-665. https://doi.org/10.1139/e02-083
5. Erickson, G. M., Currie, P. J., Inouye, B. D. & Winn, A. A. (2006). Tyrannosaur life tables: an example of nonavian dinosaur population biology. Science 313: 213-217. https://doi.org/10.1126/science.1125721
6. Osborn, H. F. (1905). Tyrannosaurus and other Cretaceous carnivorous dinosaurs. Bulletin of the American Museum of Natural History 21: 259-265. https://digitallibrary.amnh.org/handle/2246/1464
7. Paul, G. S. (2016). The Princeton Field Guide to Dinosaurs (2nd edition). Princeton University Press.

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Cite as: "Albertosaurus sarcophagus". DinoDex. https://dinodex.club/dinosaurs/albertosaurus-sarcophagus (updated 2026-09-27).