Vectipelta barretti, a new ankylosaurian dinosaur from the Lower Cretaceous Wessex Formation of the Isle of Wight, UK

The Wealden Group of southern England was deposited by rivers, on floodplains and in lagoons during the Early Cretaceous. Two historically significant ankylosaurs, Polacanthus and Hylaeosaurus, are currently known from its deposits; Hylaeosaurus from the 'lower Wealden fauna' and Polacanth...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Published in:Journal of systematic palaeontology 2023-01, Vol.21 (1)
Main Authors: Pond, Stuart, Strachan, Sarah-Jane, Raven, Thomas J., Simpson, Martin I., Morgan, Kirsty, Maidment, Susannah C. R.
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Ankylosauria
Barremian
Cretaceous
Dinosauria
Fauna
Floodplains
Lagoons
Museum collections
Museums
New genera
New genus
New species
Ornithischia
osteology
Rivers
Taxa
taxonomy
Wealden Group
Citations: Items that this one cites
Items that cite this one
Online Access:Get full text
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
Description
Summary:The Wealden Group of southern England was deposited by rivers, on floodplains and in lagoons during the Early Cretaceous. Two historically significant ankylosaurs, Polacanthus and Hylaeosaurus, are currently known from its deposits; Hylaeosaurus from the 'lower Wealden fauna' and Polacanthus from the 'upper Wealden fauna'. Here, we describe a new genus and species of ankylosaur from the Wessex Formation of the Isle of Wight, which is characterized by numerous postcranial autapomorphies. Vectipelta barretti gen. et sp. nov. is 6-8 million years older than Polacanthus, and at least 3 million years younger than Hylaeosaurus, suggesting a more complicated pattern of faunal turnover in the Wealden Group than previously realized. Vectipelta does not appear to be closely related to either of the other Wealden taxa, but instead is found in a clade with two Chinese ankylosaurs, suggesting a complex pattern of dispersal to and from Europe, North America and Asia during the Early Cretaceous. The historic practise of cataloguing all ankylosaur material from the Wessex Formation as 'Polacanthus' has potentially prevented a diversity of taxa from being discovered, and new and existing material in museum collections should be re-appraised using an autapomorphy-driven approach. http://zoobank.org/urn:lsid:zoobank.org:pub:0B19B56E-971D-4316-A92C-FC9AB29BBC38
ISSN:1477-2019
1478-0941
DOI:10.1080/14772019.2023.2210577