240-million-year-old ‘huge pig with a turtle’s beak’ discovered: All you need to know about Dinodontosaurus isiyavamanda

Picture this: a lumbering animal built like a giant pig, toothless except for a curved beak like a turtle’s, and sprouting two impressive tusks. Now imagine it plodding through what’s now Tanzania, 240 million years ago — so far back that dinosaurs were still just getting started. If it sounds like something from a sci-fi movie, you’re not far off. But this animal, Dinodontosaurus isiyavamanda, is very much real, thanks to a set of fossils that’s been waiting in a museum for decades.And now, here’s the story: per The Sun, a team at the University of Bristol took a fresh look at some old bones stashed at London’s Natural History Museum since the 1960s. They realized they had a brand-new prehistoric species on their hands; not just another oddball, but a creature that can actually help scientists fine-tune the age of rocks in Tanzania.