The Fighting Dinosaurs

The Fighting Dinosaurs is a famous and scientifically important fossil specimen that hails from the Late Cretaceous Djadokhta Formation of Mongolia. It preserves a Protoceratops andrewsi and Velociraptor mongoliensis trapped in combat and provides direct evidence of predatory behavior in non-avian dinosaurs. The specimen was discovered in 1971 and has caused much debate as to how both animals came to be preserved together with relative completeness. Multiple hypotheses have been proposed, including a drowning scenario, burial by either dune collapse or sandstorm, or alternatively they were not buried simultaneously.