"Turtle " the toothless creature

Turtle, reptile with a bony or leathery shell. Any shelled reptile can be called a turtle, but in North America people commonly use the word tortoise to designate members of a family of turtles that live entirely on land, reserving the word turtle for species that live in or near water. The word terrapin, of Native American origin, is used in North America only for the diamond-backed terrapin, a turtle that lives in the brackish waters of eastern coastal marshes

Turtles are ancient life forms that first appeared on Earth during the Triassic Period, which extended from about 240 million to 205 million years ago. Turtles survived the disasters that wiped out the dinosaurs and many other creatures at the end of the Mesozoic Era about 65 million years ago. The earliest known fossil turtles were similar to the turtles that live today. The earliest turtles had teeth, unlike today’s turtles, which are toothless and use their sharp jaws to bite and handle food. Early turtles also had not yet evolved the ability to pull their heads into their shells.