181
Views
0
CrossRef citations to date
0
Altmetric
Research Article

New theropod remains from the late Barremian (Early Cretaceous) of Eastern Iberian Peninsula

, ORCID Icon & ORCID Icon
Received 06 Dec 2023, Accepted 17 Jan 2024, Published online: 31 Jan 2024
 

ABSTRACT

In the last decade, the Iberian Peninsula has become a hot spot in the understanding of the early evolutionary history of large-bodied theropods from the Early Cretaceous, especially for the Spinosauridae and Carcharodontosauridae families. To date, at least five species of spinosaurids and one species of carcharodontosaurid inhabited the Iberian region during the Barremian. However, the discovery of new fossil remains suggests that such a diversity of medium- to large-sized theropods could be even higher. Here, we describe an unpublished large theropod tooth and two caudal vertebrae collected in the late 70s in the upper Barremian strata of the Arcillas de Morella Formation (Morella, eastern Spain). The tooth element displays a series of features that allow its identification as cf. Protathlitis, while the vertebral elements are tentatively attributed to an indeterminate carcharodontosaurid. Interestingly, these last remains are different from those of Concavenator, allowing speculation about the occurrence of another species of carcharodontosaurid allosauroids in the Iberian Peninsula during the Early Cretaceous apart from the famed humpbacked dinosaurs and with some reminiscence to Acrocanthosaurus. Therefore, the new findings clearly illustrate the significance of any new theropod remains in depicting the theropod diversity before the final break-up of Pangea in the Iberian Peninsula.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Supplemental data

Supplemental data for this article can be accessed online at https://doi.org/10.1080/08912963.2024.2308220

Additional information

Funding

This research is supported by the CERCA Programme/Generalitat de Catalunya. AS research is supported by the project VIGEOCULT [PLEC2021-00793] and funded by MCIN/AEI/10.13039/501100011033 and the European Union NextGenerationEU/PRTR. AS is member of the Consolidate Research Group ‘Reptilian Ecosystems’ [2021 SGR 01192], approved by the Generalitat de Catalunya. The authors thank the collaboration of the ICP Collections Manager and the institution for granting valuable historical information about the studies specimen. This manuscript benefited from comments from two anonymous reviewers and editor Gareth Dyke.

Log in via your institution

Log in to Taylor & Francis Online

PDF download + Online access

  • 48 hours access to article PDF & online version
  • Article PDF can be downloaded
  • Article PDF can be printed
USD 61.00 Add to cart

Issue Purchase

  • 30 days online access to complete issue
  • Article PDFs can be downloaded
  • Article PDFs can be printed
USD 471.00 Add to cart

* Local tax will be added as applicable

Related Research

People also read lists articles that other readers of this article have read.

Recommended articles lists articles that we recommend and is powered by our AI driven recommendation engine.

Cited by lists all citing articles based on Crossref citations.
Articles with the Crossref icon will open in a new tab.