Delapparentia
A large iguanodont dinosaur from Early Cretaceous Spain.
Delapparentia is a genus of iguanodont dinosaur from the Early Cretaceous of Spain, known from a partial skeleton found in Galve, Teruel. Originally classified as Iguanodon bernissartensis, it was later recognized as a distinct genus.
Quick Facts
- Type species
- Delapparentia turolensis
Facts from the source article.
Discovery and naming
The partial skeleton of Delapparentia was unearthed in spring 1958 by amateur fossil hunter José María Herrero Marzo. Professor Dimas Fernández-Galiano, aided by a Dutch team from the University of Utrecht led by Gustav Heinrich Ralph von Koenigswald, collected the specimen starting on 25 September 1958. In 1960, Albert-Félix de Lapparent assigned these remains to Iguanodon bernissartensis. The adult individual, missing its skull, came from the early Barremian Camarillas Formation and includes vertebrae, ribs, ossified tendons, and pelvic bones. Some bones originally mistaken for the sauropod Aragosaurus were later recognized as belonging to this dinosaur. José Ignacio Ruiz-Omeñaca first proposed the name Delapparentia turolensis in a 2006 dissertation, then validly published it in 2011. The genus honors de Lapparent, while the species name comes from Turia, the Latin name for Teruel.
Description
Delapparentia was about 15% longer than Iguanodon bernissartensis, with an estimated length of 10 m and weight of 3.5 tonnes. Its ilium measures 78 cm. Autapomorphies include posterior dorsal ribs with long, parallel, unfused capitula and tubercula, ossified sternal ribs, and a straight, lateromedially expanded preacetabular process of the ilium. It also has anterior dorsal ribs with a pneumatic foramen and a large ischium relative to the ilium. Later study recognized proportionally high neural spines and related it to Barilium based on ilium morphology.
Classification
Ruiz-Omeñaca assigned Delapparentia to Iguanodontoidea in 2011. Its status as a distinct taxon has been challenged; a study of individual variation in Iguanodon bernissartensis found its neural spine proportions within that species' range, suggesting Delapparentia represents an old adult I. bernissartensis. However, a 2026 study found it distinct and more closely related to Magnamanus and "Iguanodon" galvensis, the latter of which they suggested would require a new genus name.
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