Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • adjective Of, relating to, or being the era of geologic time from about 251 to 65 million years ago. The Mesozoic Era includes the Triassic, Jurassic, and Cretaceous Periods and is characterized by the development of flying reptiles, birds, and flowering plants and by the appearance and extinction of dinosaurs.
  • noun The Mesozoic Era.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • In geology, lying, as a part of the geological series so designated, between the Paleozoic and the Tertiary rocks.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • adjective (Geol.) Belonging, or relating, to the secondary or reptilian age, or the era between the Paleozoic and Cenozoic. See Chart of geology.
  • noun The Mesozoic age or formation.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • adjective geology Of a geologic era within the Phanerozoic eon that comprises the Triassic, Jurassic and Cretaceous periods from about 230 to 65 million years ago, when life on earth was dominated by reptiles.
  • proper noun geology The Mesozoic era.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • noun from 230 million to 63 million years ago
  • adjective of or relating to or denoting the Mesozoic era

Etymologies

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

meso- + -zoic

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