Altispinax Facts
| Diet | Carnivore |
| Height | 3.5m |
| Length | 10m |
| Weight | 2.5 tonnes |
| Environment | Land |
| Era | Cretaceous |
| Period | Early Cretaceous |
| Type | Theropod |
| Location | England |

| Diet | Carnivore |
| Height | 3.5m |
| Length | 10m |
| Weight | 2.5 tonnes |
| Environment | Land |
| Era | Cretaceous |
| Period | Early Cretaceous |
| Type | Theropod |
| Location | England |
Altispinax was a large predatory theropod dinosaur that stalked the landscapes of Early Cretaceous England between 145 and 125 million years ago. This fearsome carnivore lived in what is now East Sussex, where its fragmentary remains were discovered in the Wadhurst Clay Formation. As its name suggests, Altispinax possessed distinctively tall neural spines on its vertebrae, giving it a characteristic high-backed appearance.
Measuring approximately 10 metres in length and standing about 3.5 metres tall at the hip, Altispinax was a formidable predator that would have weighed around 2.5 tonnes. Like other theropods, it walked on two powerful legs and used its strong jaws filled with sharp teeth to hunt other dinosaurs and large prey. Its elongated skull housed keen senses that helped it track down victims in the lush, warm environments of Early Cretaceous Britain.
However, Altispinax remains one of the more mysterious dinosaurs known to science. The fossil evidence consists primarily of vertebral bones, making it difficult for palaeontologists to determine its exact relationships to other theropod groups. Some scientists have suggested it may be related to spinosaurids or megalosaurids, whilst others believe it could represent an entirely different lineage of large predatory dinosaurs.
The fragmentary nature of Altispinax fossils has led to ongoing debates about whether all the assigned remains actually belong to the same species, or if they represent multiple different theropod dinosaurs that lived in Early Cretaceous England.
Altispinax was characterised by its unusually tall neural spines on the vertebrae, which would have created a distinctive high ridge along its back. These elongated spines were much taller than those found in most other theropod dinosaurs of similar size.
As a large theropod, Altispinax was likely an active predator that hunted other dinosaurs and large animals in its territory. It probably used its powerful legs for pursuit and its strong jaws to deliver killing bites to prey, though its exact hunting strategies remain unknown due to limited fossil evidence.
Altispinax was first described by Friedrich von Huene in 1923. The original fossils were discovered at Wadhurst Clay Formation, East Sussex, England.