Magyarosaurus dacus

Magyarosaurus is a genus of dwarf sauropod dinosaur from late Cretaceous Period in today's Transylvania. It is one of the smallest-known adult sauropods, measuring less than 3 m (9.8 ft) meters long and weighing less than 1,000 kg (2,200 lb). The type and only species is Magyarosaurus dacus. It has been found to be a close relative of Rapetosaurus in the family Saltasauridae in the sauropod clade Titanosauria in a 2005 study.

Magyarosaurus dacus

Díez Díaz et al. (2025) · CC BY 4.0 · via Wikipedia/Commons. May be a photograph of a specimen, or an artist’s reconstruction — an interpretation of a skeleton, since colour and soft tissue are almost never preserved.

On record

Recorded, not inferred
Sits inside
MagyarosaurusPBDB
Diet
herbivorePBDB, for Sauropoda
Life habit
ground dwelling, gregariousPBDB, for Sauropoda
Motility
actively mobilePBDB, for Sauropoda
Environment
terrestrialPBDB, for Sauropoda

Time the record covers

At most 6.2 million years on record.

Every occurrence read is dated to somewhere between 72.2 Mya and 66 Mya, and nothing in the dating separates them, so that window is what the record shows rather than a span.

Late Cretaceous — about 7 of 7 occurrencesLate CretaceousPaleocene — about 0 of 7 occurrences72–72 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences72–72 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences72–72 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences72–71 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences71–71 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences71–71 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences71–71 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences71–70 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences70–70 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences70–70 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences70–70 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences70–69 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences69–69 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences69–69 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences69–69 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences69–68 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences68–68 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences68–68 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences68–68 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences68–67 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences67–67 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences67–67 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences67–67 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences67–66 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences66–66 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences66–66 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences72.7 Mya65.5 Mya

7 occurrences of Magyarosaurus dacus on record, most of them in the Late Cretaceous. Bar height is expected occurrences, not a count: each fossil is spread across the span it is dated to, so a tall narrow bar means tight dating and a low wide one means loose.

When

7 occurrences

These are dates about fossils, not the animal: the record can only begin after it arose and end before it died out, so either end may reach further. Shares are expected occurrences: a fossil dated to a span is counted partly in each period it straddles. More on what this infers.

Found in

4 formations

Densuș-Ciula — 45.62°N, 22.78°EPui Beds — 45.49°N, 23.09°ESebeş — 46.04°N, 23.52°ESînpetru — 45.55°N, 22.92°E

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The named rock units Magyarosaurus dacus has been recovered from, largest first. Drawn where the rock is now, not where it formed.

Magyarosaurus dacus and its relatives

Late Cretaceous

Where Magyarosaurus dacus and its relatives were recorded in the Late Cretaceous.

Found in the same rock

60 taxa

The Paleobiology Database records 7 sites for Magyarosaurus dacus, and this reads all of them. The number is how many of those sites it was catalogued from too. The 24 sharing the most are listed.

This is not a list of everything alive at the time. It is only what has come out of the same ground as this animal and been written down.

Entered from

5 references

Each of the 7 occurrences read was entered from one of these publications, ordered by how many each accounts for. This is not a search for papers mentioning the name. Entries link to doi.org where the Paleobiology Database holds an identifier, and to its own record where it does not. Relayed as the Paleobiology Database holds them, not checked against what they resolve to.

Media and terms

Media content1

Picture of Magyarosaurus dacus

Credit
Díez Díaz et al. (2025)
Licence
CC BY 4.0
Commercial use
the licence allows it

No 3D scan was found. Smithsonian Open Access, MorphoSource and Sketchfab were all searched.

The description on this site

Licence
CC BY-SA 4.0

This is what the site found, which is not the same as what exists.

Keep going

What may have been alongside itMagyarosaurus through timeFormations of the Late CretaceousThe world it lived on

Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0. (Nopcsa 1915)