First lambeosaurine hadrosaurid from Europe: palaeobiogeographical implications

New dinosaur specimens from the uppermost Cretaceous of Spain represent the first record of a lambeosaurine hadrosaurid from Europe. This discovery, w hich consists of skull, mandible, and postcranial remains from the Tremp Ba sin (Lleida Province, Catalonia), is particularly unexpected because lambeo saurines are otherwise well known from western North America and central an d eastern Asia. Originally named Pararhabdodon isonensis, a species previou sly regarded as a basal iguanodontian dinosaur, new material indicates that Pararhabdodon is in fact a primitive member of the lambeosaurine clade. Th e presence of lambeosaurines on the Iberian Peninsula at the very end of th e Cretaceous period is likely due to vicariance rather than dispersal. The distribution of hadrosaurids suggests biogeographic differences across the European archipelaeo at the end of the Cretaceous.