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'Hogwarts' Dragon Unveiled By Larry O'Hanlon, Animal Planet News May 24 — A dragon-like dinosaur named after Harry Potter's alma mater has performed a bit of black magic on its own family tree, say paleontologists who unveiled the "Dragon King of Hogwarts" on Monday in Albuquerque. The newly described horny-headed dinosaur Dracorex hogwartsia lived about 66 million years ago in South Dakota, just a million years short of the extinction of all dinosaurs. But its flat, almost storybook-style dragon head has overturned everything paleontologists thought they knew about the dome-head dinos called pachycephalosaurs. "What you knew about pachycephalosaurs — you...

Dracorex hogwartsia is Tribute to J. K. Rowling Series HARRISBURG – Visitors to the State Museum can get a taste of Harry Potter and brush with prehistoric America with a newly discovered dinosaur species that got its name thanks to the help of a Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission paleontologist. PHMC paleontologist Robert M. Sullivan helped world-renowned paleontologist Robert T. Bakker come up with the name Dracorex hogwartsia in honor of the fictional “Hogwarts Academy” from the popular books and films based on Harry Potter’s adventures by British author J. K. Rowling. The scientific name Dracorex hogwartsia means “dragon king.”...

INDIANAPOLIS - The 66-million-year-old skull of a dinosaur whose name was inspired by the Harry Potter series has found a permanent home in the Children's Museum of Indianapolis. Dracorex hogwartsia will be housed permanently at the museum, officials and paleontologist Robert Bakker were to announce Monday. The dinosaur's name was taken from the Latin words for dragon and king, and the fictional Hogwarts School for Witchcraft and Wizardry in J.K. Rowling's Harry Potter novels. Rowling agreed to the name because her two children are dinosaur fans. "The naming of Dracorex hogwartsia is easily the most unexpected honour to have come...