Friuli-Venezia Giulia
"Antonio"
Tethyshadros insularis
Complete dinosaur skeleton, holotype of the species
Description
One of the most complete dinosaur fossils ever discovered in Europe, the specimen, nicknamed Antonio, measures 4 meters long and 1.30 meters high.
Discovered in 1994 at the Villaggio del Pescatore fossil site, it was extracted from limestone during the 1998–99 excavation campaign, funded by the Ministry of Culture. The extraction was carried out using the same technique employed in the “marble” quarries of the Karst, which involves cutting the rock into blocks using a diamond wire.
Subsequent treatment with diluted formic acid highlighted the exceptional state of preservation, revealing details such as the ossified tendons of the tail. Displayed in its limestone matrix, Antonio is preserved in anatomical position, with all skeletal elements articulated.
A member of the hadrosaurid group, relatives of the largest and most famous “duck-billed” dinosaurs, Antonio was a young individual about eleven years old, as revealed by histological analysis of a thin section of a rib.
The discovery of Antonio, along with numerous terrestrial and marine remains, sparked an intensive research effort aimed at reconstructing the environment in which it was preserved. Thanks to isotopic studies (to determine whether the environment was marine, brackish, or freshwater) and microfossil analysis, researchers identified Late Cretaceous coastal lagoon setting dating back approximately 80 million years ago.
Classification and size comparison
Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Chordata
Class: Reptilia
Superorder: Dinosauria
Order: †Ornitischia
Suborder: †Ornithopoda
Superfamily: †Hadrosauroidea
Genus: †Tethyshadros
Species: †Tethyshadros insularis
Dalla Vecchia, 2009
Modified from “Tethyshadros TD.png” , provides evidence for the reconstruction of TotalDino, from Wikimedia Commons,
licensed under CC BY‑SA 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/).
Geologic Time Scale
- ERA: Mesozoic
- PERIOD: Cretaceous
- EPOCH: Late Cretaceous
- ETÀ: Campaniano (83.6-72.1 Ma)
An age characterized by a generally warm climate, with large continental areas surrounded by shallow seas. Currently, the chronostratigraphic boundary representative of this age is located in Italy, at the Gola del Bottaccione (Bottaccione Gorge) in Gubbio (Perugia).
Site of discovery
Villaggio del Pescatore, Duino Aurisina (TS)
Display location
Museo Civico di Storia Naturale di Trieste
Catalogue number:
57021
Luogo di esposizione di calchi
Collezione di Geologia "Museo Giovanni Capellini"
Not alone
Antonio is not the only Tethyshadros specimen found at the Villaggio del Pescatore site.
A second specimen, named “Bruno”, was discovered in 1999 and made available to the public in 2019, after the missing parts were recovered.
“Bruno” is nearly one meter longer than “Antonio,” but only 70% of it remains intact. What makes it unique is its posture: it is bent 180 degrees along its longitudinal axis, with its bones plastically deformed, evidence of specific taphonomic conditions during fossilization.
Gallery
A complete but severely deformed skull (inventory number 57026) belonging to the specimen known as “Secundus,” excavated in 1996–97.
Cervical vertebra with the right cervical rib still attached (inventory number 57025), recovered during the 1992 excavation.
Left pubis of Tethyshadros (inventory number 57023), recovered in 1992.
A pair of forelimbs from another Tethyshadros specimen named “Primus” (inventory number 57022), the only known part of the individual that was excavated as early as 1992.
Paleoart corner
Bibliography:
- Arbulla D. (2017). Ritrovamenti paleontologici. Il sito a dinosauri del Villaggio del Pescatore. Atti
e Memorie della Commissione Grotte “E. Boegan”, 47: 87-107. - Arbulla D., Cotza F., Cucchi F., Dalla Vecchia F.M., De Giusto A., Flora O., Masetti D., Palci A.,
Pittau P., Pugliese N., Stenni B., Tarlao A., Tunis G. & Zini L. (2006). L’escursione nel Carso Triestino,
in Slovenia e Croazia. 8 giugno. Stop 1. La successione Santoniano-Campaniana del Villaggio
del Pescatore (Carso Triestino) nel quale sono stati rinvenuti i resti di dinosauro. In Melis R.,
Romano R., Fonda G. (eds.), Guida alle escursioni/excursions guide, Società Paleontologica
Italiana – Giornate di Paleontologia 2006, EUT Edizioni Università di Trieste: 20-27. - Chiarenza A.A., Fabbri M., Consorti L., Muscioni M., Evans D.C., Cantalapiedra J.L. & Fanti F.
(2021). An Italian dinosaur Lagerstätte reveals the tempo and mode of hadrosauriform body size
evolution. Scientific Reports, 11: 23295. - Consorti L., Arbulla D., Bonini L., Fabbi S., Fanti F., Franceschi M., Frijia G. & Pini G.A. (2021). The
Mesozoic palaeoenvironmental richness of the Trieste Karst. Geological Field Trips and Maps, 13:
1-40. - Dalla Vecchia F.M. (2008). I dinosauri del Villaggio del Pescatore (Trieste): qualche
aggiornamento. Atti del Museo Civico di Storia Naturale di Trieste, 53: 111-130. - Dalla Vecchia F.M. (2009). Tethyshadros insularis, a new hadrosauroid dinosaur (Ornithischia)
from the Upper Cretaceous of Italy. Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology, 29: 1100-1116. - Dalla Vecchia F.M. (2020). The unusual tail of Tethyshadros insularis (Dinosauria, Hadrosauroidea)
from the Adriatic Island of the European Archipelago. Rivista Italiana di Paleontologia e
Stratigrafia, 126: 583-628.
Credits and acknowledgments
We would like to extend our heartfelt thanks to Dr. Deborah Arbulla of the Civic Museum of Natural History in Trieste for sharing the multimedia material used on this page.
We would also like to thank Dr. Patrizia Loccardi of the Soprintendenza Archeologia, Belle Arti e Paesaggio for Friuli-Venezia Giulia for her support and collaboration, as well as all the paleoartists for granting permission to publish their works.
All images on this website are used with permission from the MiC – Soprintendenza ABAP FVG. Further reproduction of these images is governed by current legislation (Article 108, paragraph 3 of Legislative Decree 42/2004, as amended – Ministerial Decree 108/24), and their reproduction for profit is prohibited.
Reproduction, distribution, or any other use is prohibited without prior authorization from the rights holders.