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A hidden diversity of ceratopsian dinosaurs in Late Cretaceous Europe

Nature volume 651, pages 397–403 (2026)Cite this article

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Abstract

Late Cretaceous Europe was an archipelago with a dinosaur fauna characterized by island effects such as low diversity, relictualism and insular dwarfism1. Its dinosaur communities include a unique mix of groups with typical Laurasian or Gondwanan affinities and distinctive endemics1. Chief among the latter are rhabdodontids, considered to be early-branching iguanodontians characterized by unusual dental and postcranial features and known from abundant but very incomplete fossil remains2,3. By contrast, unequivocal evidence of horned dinosaurs (ceratopsians) is puzzlingly absent4, despite their ubiquitous occurrence in contemporary ecosystems of Asia and North America. Ajkaceratops from the Late Cretaceous of Hungary was described as the first definite ceratopsian from Europe5, but this identification has been strongly disputed4. Here we describe new material of Ajkaceratops and conduct phylogenetic analyses that support its ceratopsian affinities. Our results unexpectedly demonstrate that some ‘rhabdodontid’ taxa are not, in fact, iguanodontians but actually ceratopsians. This suggests a substantial but previously hidden diversity and evolutionary history of European horned dinosaurs, and co-occurrence of iguanodontians and ceratopsians indicates greater similarity than previously appreciated to other Laurasian ecosystems. Our results challenge conventional understanding of ornithischian dinosaur evolution and indicate the need for a fundamental re-evaluation of the Late Cretaceous herbivorous dinosaur assemblages of Europe.

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Fig. 1: Articulated skull of MTM 2025.1.1, A. kozmai.
Fig. 2: Retrodeformed skull of MTM 2025.1.1, A. kozmai in comparison with the early-diverging iguanodontian Tenontosaurus tilletti and the neoceratopsian Protoceratops andrewsi.
Fig. 3: Phylogenetic position of A. kozmai(=‘M. vorosi’) and other ‘rhabdodontid’ taxa.

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Data availability

Raw μCT of MTM 2025.1.1 has been reposited in Zenodo60 (https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.17098636). All other data, including phylogenetic matrices, are available in the Supplementary Information.

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Acknowledgements

We thank M. Dempsey for artwork; the 2000–2024 Iharkút field crews for field assistance; G. Ferreira (Universität Tübingen) for µCT scanning; M. Vremir and M. Norell for discussion of Transylvanian island faunas; T. Tortosa and E. Turini (Museum d’Histoire Naturalle Aix-en-Provence) for providing a photograph of the ischium of the Aix ‘Rhabododon’; the Willi Hennig Society for free provision of TNT; and the peer reviewers for their comments on an earlier draft. A.Ő. and the Iharkút fieldwork was supported by the MTA ELTE Lendület Dinosaur Research Group (grant no. 95102), the National Research, Development and Innovation Office (NKFIH K 131597), the Hungarian Natural History Museum, Eötvös Loránd University, the Jurassic Foundation and the Hungarian Dinosaur Foundation. F.J.A. was funded by the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (German Research Foundation)–Projektnummer (grant number) 533750820. S.L.B. was supported by a Marie Curie Career Integration Grant EC 630652, the Division of Paleontology of the American Museum of Natural History and the School of Geosciences of the University of Edinburgh during the course of his work on Transylvanian islands. Silhouettes in Fig. 3 are from PhyloPic (https://phylopic.com): Pachycephalosaurus by E. Willoughby and Orodromeus by P. Buchholz are made available under a Creative Commons licence CC BY-SA 3.0; Archaeoceratops by S. Hartman is made available under a Creative Commons licence CC BY-NC-SA 3.0; Protoceratops by S. Hartman is made available under a Creative Commons licence CC BY 3.0; Triceratops is freely available under a Creative Commons licence CC 0 1.0; Iguanodon by W. Toosey is made available under a Creative Commons licence CC BY 4.0. This publication is a contribution to the Natural History Museum’s Evolution of Life Research Theme.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Fossil Reptiles, Amphibians and Birds Section, Natural History Museum, London, UK

    Susannah C. R. Maidment

  2. School of Geography, Earth and Environmental Sciences, University of Birmingham, Birmingham, UK

    Susannah C. R. Maidment, Richard J. Butler & Luke E. Meade

  3. School of Geosciences, The King’s Buildings, University of Edinburgh, Edinburgh, UK

    Stephen L. Brusatte

  4. Department of Geosciences, University of Tübingen, Tübingen, Germany

    Felix J. Augustin

  5. Faculty of Geology and Geophysics, University of Bucharest, Bucharest, Romania

    Zoltán Csiki-Sava

  6. Department of Palaeontology, Institute of Geography and Earth Sciences, ELTE Eötvös Loránd University, Budapest, Hungary

    Zoltán Csiki-Sava & Attila Ősi

Authors
  1. Susannah C. R. Maidment
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  2. Richard J. Butler
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  6. Zoltán Csiki-Sava
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  7. Attila Ősi
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Contributions

Discovery and excavation of the specimen were done by A.Ő. The project was conceived by A.Ő. and Z.C.-S. Anatomical description was done by A.Ő. and S.C.R.M. CT segmentation and digital skull reconstruction were performed by L.E.M. Coding of phylogenetic matrices was done by S.C.R.M., R.J.B., A.Ő. and F.J.A. Phylogenetic analyses were conducted by S.C.R.M. and S.L.B. Initial writing and drafting of figures were done by S.C.R.M., R.J.B., A.Ő., L.E.M. and Z.C.-S. Corrections and approval of the final draft of the manuscript were done by S.C.R.M., A.Ő., Z.C.-S., R.J.B., S.L.B. and F.J.A.

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Susannah C. R. Maidment.

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Nature thanks Andrew Farke, Eric Morschhauser and Hans-Dieter Sues for their contribution to the peer review of this work. Peer reviewer reports are available.

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Extended data figures and tables

Extended Data Fig. 1 Skull elements of MTM 2025.1.1, Ajkaceratops kozmai.

a, b, Snout, comprising possible fused rostral and premaxillae in a, left lateral and b, ventral views. c, d, Left maxilla in c, lateral and d, medial views. e, f, Skull roof in e, dorsal and f, ventral views. g, h, Left jugal in g, lateral and h, medial views. i, Detail of maxillary tooth in labial view. Abbreviations: af, accessory fenestra; aof, ventral margin of antorbital fossa; apm, anterior process of left maxilla; en, external naris; f, frontal; lpm, left premaxilla; mp, maxillary process of the left jugal; n, nasal; orb, posteroventral margin of the orbit; pf, prefrontal plp, posterolateral process of the left premaxilla; po, postorbital; pp, postorbital process of the left jugal; rpm, right premaxilla; stf, supratemporal foramen; vpp, vaulted premaxillary palate. Skull elements are shown to scale, except for the detail of the tooth.

Extended Data Fig. 2 Retrodeformed skull of MTM 2025.1.1, Ajkaceratops kozmai.

a, Anterior; b, left lateral; c, dorsal; and d, posterior views.

Extended Data Fig. 3 Lower jaw elements of Ajkaceratops and ‘Mochlodon’ compared.

a, Referred predentary and anterior dentary of Ajkaceratos kozmai (MTM PAL 2025.47.1; note this specimen was given an incorrect specimen number in Czepiński and Madzia5, and b, the holotype dentary of ‘Mochlodon vorosi’ (MTM V 2010.105.1.) in left lateral view (a is mirrored to facilitate comparison). An elevated tubercle (tub) on the on the anterodorsal dentary (d) was identified as an autapomorphy of Ajkaceratops by Czepiński and Madzia5, and a similar feature is observed lying just posterior to the predentary facet (prdf) in the holotype dentary of ‘Mochlodon’. This was described as a dorsally-rounded vertical wall in Ősi et al.27, and was identified as an autapomorphy of ‘Mochlodon vorosi’ therein. Abbreviations: d, dentary; dep, depression; prd, predentary; prdf, predentary facet; tub, tubercle. Scale bars equal to 2 cm.

Extended Data Fig. 4 Partial right dentary of Ferenceratops shqiperorum, NHMUK PV R 4900.

a, Lateral; b, medial; and c, dorsal views; with d, close-up of the single preserved, penultimate dentary tooth in lingual view.

Extended Data Fig. 5 Selected postcranial elements of Ferenceratops shqiperorum, NHMUK PV R 4900.

a, b, Left coracoid in a, lateral and b, medial views. c-e, Left scapula in c, lateral, d, medial and e, proximal views. f, g, Right ischium in f, lateral and g, medial views. h-m, Left femur in h, anterior; i, medial; j, posterior; k, lateral; l, proximal; and m, distal views. All elements represented at the same scale.

Extended Data Fig. 6 Ischia of a variety of cerapodan dinosaurs in lateral view and drawn to the same length for comparison.

a, Right ischium of Ferenceratops shqiperorum, NHMUK PV R 4900. b, Left ischium (reversed) of Psittacosaurus neimongoliensis, IVPP [Institute of Vertebrate Palaeontology and Palaeoanthropology, Beijing, China] V120888, an early-diverging ceratopsian. c, Left proximal (c1 – reversed) and right distal (c2) ischia of Protoceratops andrewsi, an early-diverging neoceratopsian (from Słowiak et al.61). Panel c was adapted from ref. 61, PeerJ Inc., under a Creative Commons licence CC BY 4.0. d, Right ischium of Archaeoceratops oshimai, IVPP V11114, an early-diverging neoceratopsian. e, Left ischium (reversed) of Chasmosaurus belli, ROM [Royal Ontario Museum, Toronto, Canada] 843, a ceratopsid. f, Left ischium (reversed) of MHN AIX.PV.1995.13, the Aix ‘Rhabdodon’, a western European ‘rhabdodontid’. Panel f was adapted with permission from T. Tortosa and E. Turini. g, Right ischium of ROM 804, Parksosaurus warreni, an early-diverging ornithopod. h, Right ischium of NHMUK PV R 193, Hypsilophodon foxii, an early-diverging ornithopod. i, Right ischium of MM [Manchester Museum, UK] LL12275, Tenontosaurus tilletti, an early-diverging iguanodontian. j, Right ischium of NHMUK PV R 11521, Mantellisaurus atherfieldensis, an early-diverging hadrosauroid. Abbreviations: ob.p., obturator process.

Extended Data Fig. 7 Life reconstruction of Ajkaceratops kozmai.

Ajkaceratops lack the frills and horns characteristic of North American ceratopsids. The illustration was reproduced with permission from Matthew Dempsey.

Supplementary information

Supplementary Data (download PDF )

This file contains more details on the phylogenetic analyses carried out.

Reporting Summary (download PDF )

Ajkaceratops_Han_Final_R1

A phylogenetic matrix in TNT format to implement the Han et al. analysis (see Methods for details).

Ajkaceratops_Dieudonne_Final_R1

A phylogenetic matrix in TNT format to implement the Dieudonne et al. analysis (see Methods for details).

Peer Review File (download PDF )

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Maidment, S.C.R., Butler, R.J., Brusatte, S.L. et al. A hidden diversity of ceratopsian dinosaurs in Late Cretaceous Europe. Nature 651, 397–403 (2026). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41586-025-09897-w

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41586-025-09897-w

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