Ancient Stubby-Legged Reptiles with Tiny Heads Were World Travelers

Before dinosaurs roamed the planet, tanklike herbivores called pareiasaurs — barrel-chested and stubby-legged turtle relatives — reigned as Earth's first large plant-eaters. With tiny heads and bony knobs studding their skulls and bodies, pareiasaurs wouldn't have won many beauty contests. Pareiasaurs lived during the Permian era, about 266 million to 252 million years ago.