| Dryptosaurus Temporal range: Late Cretaceous,
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| Reconstructed skeletons mounted in fighting pose, New Jersey State Museum. | |
Scientific classification 
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| Domain: | Eukaryota |
| Kingdom: | Animalia |
| Phylum: | Chordata |
| Clade: | Dinosauria |
| Clade: | Saurischia |
| Clade: | Theropoda |
| Clade: | †Eutyrannosauria |
| Family: | †Dryptosauridae Marsh, 1890 |
| Genus: | †Dryptosaurus Marsh, 1877 |
| Species: | †D. aquilunguis
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| Binomial name | |
| †Dryptosaurus aquilunguis (Cope, 1866 [originally Laelaps])
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| Synonyms | |
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Dryptosaurus (/ˌdrɪptoʊˈsɔːrəs/ DRIP-toh-SOR-əs) is a genus of basal eutyrannosaurian theropod dinosaur that lived on the island continent of Appalachia approximately 67.6 million years ago during the end of the Maastrichtian age of the Late Cretaceous period. Dryptosaurus was a large, bipedal, ground-dwelling carnivore that could grow up to 7.5 metres (25 ft) long and weigh up to 756–1,500 kilograms (1,667–3,307 lb). Although it is now largely unknown outside of academic circles, the famous 1897 painting of the genus by Charles R. Knight made Dryptosaurus one of the more widely known dinosaurs of its time, in spite of its poor fossil record. First described by Edward Drinker Cope in 1866 and later renamed by Othniel Charles Marsh in 1877, Dryptosaurus is among the first theropod dinosaurs ever known to science.