The Macmillan Illustrated Encyclopedia of Dinosaurs and Prehistoric Animals: A Visual Who's Who of Prehistoric Life

by Dougal Dixon, Barry Cox, R.J.G. Savage

Covers fish, amphibians, reptiles, dinosaurs, birds, mammals, and extinct creatures.

Genres: Science, Nonfiction, Reference

312 pages, Paperback

First published November 1, 1988

Reviews

[Rachel Holtzclaw · Rating 4 out of 5]

i've read a lot about dinosaurs. (like... a Lot a lot!!) i really liked that dinosaurs made up only 1/3 or so of this book, and the rest of it was spent on various other prehistoric creatures, few of which i felt well-versed in (turtles aside - they are the only living anapsids!!!!). regardless, i feel the teensiest bit smarter now. i'm also interested in how this study has already expanded, because this book is 30ish years old, so we have to know more now, right? definitely intrigued enough to pursue some research of my own!!

[Robert · Rating 4 out of 5]

Oh man, I loved this book so much when I was a kid. Great info and amazing illustrations.

[Michael P. · Rating 5 out of 5]

I owned this book as a child and browsed through it regularly. It had really beautiful, detailed illustrations, although some of them are now rather dated. I not only found the dinosaurs interesting, but also the other creatures depicted. There were some truly scary looking fish, the massive mosasaur known as Kronosaurus, and early mammals, including some truly memorable variations on the mammoth.

[Todd Martin · Rating 3 out of 5]

The MacMillan Illustrated Encyclopedia of Dinosaurs and Prehistoric is an atlas of vertebrates spanning more than 500 million years. The book begins with the jawless fishes found in Cambrian rocks over 520 million years old and ends with homo sapiens (cro-magnon man) who created the Lascaux cave paintings about 16,000 years ago. The book is divided into sections for fishes, amphibians, reptiles, ruling reptiles, birds, mammal-like reptiles and mammals. Each section features color drawings of 8-14 animals followed by a few paragraphs about each.

The book is definitely more of a reference book than a novel (it can be read straight through, but it’ll take some effort). The level of scholarship is high, as one would expect from the American Museum of Natural History, but given that the book was written in 1988 I’m sure our understanding has evolved since it was published.

[R.A. Danger · Rating 4 out of 5]

It has fish to mammals (525). With a little introduction on each group (fish, reptile etc.) After the introduction there are two pages of pictures followed by two pages of information: order, family, name, time, locality, size, and summary about the animal.