Researchers from Zaragoza have just described theSmallest plant-eating dinosaur in Spain. Is namedGideonmantellia amosanjuanae, and reached a length of just two meters with 20 kilos of weight in adulthood. With an antiquity of 130 million years, it would correspond to an agile and fast dinosaur, adapted to run fast in order to escape from predators by lacking a defensive shield, by way ofCretaceous gazelle.
Palaeontologists from the Aragosaurus-IUCA research group at the University of Zaragoza have reached these conclusions after analyzing 104 remains of a single individual, the most complete skeleton of an ornithopod dinosaur found in Spain. As explained in the scientific journal Palevol, the fossils were found in 1982 in the Teruel town of Galve. Specifically, it is the fourth dinosaur described in this municipality, after Aragosaurus, Galvesaurus and Delapparentia, which makes it the most important nucleus in continental Europe in terms of the number of dinosaurs (not counting the birds) described. For more than 15 years, the fossils have been exhibited in the Museum of said municipality, where it is known as El Hipsi de Galve.
The investigation of these fossil remains, directed by José Ignacio Canudo, has revealed that, in reality, it is a new dinosaur, presenting a unique morphology in the bones of the hip and the beginning of the tail, not described in any another dinosaur. Among the fossils have been foundvertebrae, part of the hip and hind limb, including a practically complete foot. However,nothing was recovered from the skull, although teeth isolated from other sites could belong to this dinosaur.
The reconstruction made from the preserved bones allows a length of more than one meter to be targeted. The specimen is immature, and would not have completely stopped growing, so in its adult stage it could be somewhat older and reach 2 meters in length. Accustomed to giant dinosaurs, this small dinosaur is a novelty in Spain and allows us to have a vision of the Mesozoic world, with large and small vertebrates. The absence of the head has made it difficult to studyGideonmantellia. Previous studies have classified this dinosaur with names of species known in other parts of Europe, the most significant being one from the Isle of Wight (England) called Hypsilophodon. This similarity with English dinosaurs would make it possible to point to the existence of a terrestrial connection between these geographical spaces, which would favor the mobility of these specimens.
The name ofGideonmantellia is a tribute toGideon Mantell, English naturalist and one of the fathers of dinosaur research. Mantell lived in the 19th century and was the first to describe and figure a hypsilophodontid fossil in 1849. The second part of the name,amosanjuanae,honors the young researcher María Olga Amo Sanjuán from the Aragosaurus group who died of illness in October 2002 during the completion of her doctoral thesis on the Lower Cretaceous egg shells of Galve.
