Subfamily
Valid Extinct

Orodrominae

Brown et al. 2013

Thescelosauridae is a clade of neornithischians from the Cretaceous of East Asia and North America. The group was originally used as a name by Charles M. Sternberg in 1937, but was not formally defined until 2013, where it was used by Brown and colleagues as the group uniting Thescelosaurus and Orodromeus, based on their phylogenetic results. During a phylogenetic revision of neornithischians by Clint Boyd in 2015, the authorship of Thescelosauridae was given to Brown and colleagues, which meant that the similar name Parksosauridae, informally defined in 2002 by Buchholz, would have had priority over Thescelosauridae. The two clades had slightly different definitions, with Parksosauridae referring to all animals closer to Parksosaurus than Hypsilophodon, but they contained the same taxa so Boyd used Parksosauridae under the assumption it had priority. However, in formalizing the clade following the regulations of the PhyloCode, Madzia, Boyd, and colleagues identified in 2021 that Sternberg was the proper authority for Thescelosauridae, giving it priority over Parksosauridae. As well, they gave Thescelosauridae the definition of the largest clade containing Thescelosaurus neglectus but not Iguanodon bernissartensis, as long as Hypsilophodon foxii was not in the group, modifying previous definitions for Thescelosauridae in order to maintain its modern use, so that the clade was not applied if Thescelosaurus fell within Hypsilophodontidae, a family that has not been recently used but may be revived if the systematic position of Hypsilophodon was solidified at some point in the future. Madzia et al. (2021) identified the analysis of Madzia et al. (2018) as the reference analysis for the name Thescelosauridae, an analysis based on a revised version of the 2015 Boyd analysis.

Temporal range
Triassic
Jurassic
Cretaceous
Paleogene
Neogene
252 201 145 66 0 Ma
PBDB occurrences
28
Group
Dinosaures
Herbivore Ground dwelling, gregarious Terrestrial
Orodrominae
click to enlarge
A Thescelosaurus at the Burpee Museum of Natural History in Rockford, Illinois, USA. Size:12 feet in length, 3 ft tall at the hip Weight: 670 lbs when alive. © Ben Jacobson (Kranar Drogin) · CC BY 2.5 · Wikimedia
PBDB Wikipedia
Classification
Dinosauria Unranked clade
Ornithischia Unranked clade
Neornithischia Unranked clade
Thescelosauridae Family
Orodrominae Subfamily
Fossil sites 28 geolocated sites
Distribution
Top countries
🇺🇸 United States
24
🇨🇦 Canada
2
🇰🇷 South Korea
2
Geological formations
Wayan
8
Oldman
3
Seonso Conglomerate
2
Blackleaf
1
Willow Tank
1
Temporal distribution
Maastrichtian (72.2–66 Ma)
1
Campanian (83.6–72.2 Ma)
13
Cenomanian (100.5–93.9 Ma)
9
Albian (113.2–100.5 Ma)
5
Images 1
Bibliography
Original description
C. M. Brown, D. C. Evans, and M. J. Ryan, A. P. Russell. 2013. New data on the diversity and abundance of small-bodied ornithopods (Dinosauria, Ornithischia) from the Belly River Group (Campanian) of Alberta. Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology 33(3):495-520 DOI ↗
Bibliography (12)
J. W. Bonde, R. L. Hall, and L. J. Krumenacker, D. J. Varricchio. 2022. Nevadadromeus schmitti (gen. et sp. nov.), a new basal neornithischian with affinities to the Thescelosaurinae, from the Upper Cretaceous (Cenomanian) Willow Tank Formation of southern Nevada. Journal of the Arizona-Nevada Academy of Science 50(1):1-8 DOI ↗
C. M. Brown, D. C. Evans, and M. J. Ryan, A. P. Russell. 2013. New data on the diversity and abundance of small-bodied ornithopods (Dinosauria, Ornithischia) from the Belly River Group (Campanian) of Alberta. Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology 33(3):495-520 DOI ↗
M. P. J. Oreska, M. T. Carrano, and K. M. Dzikiewicz. 2013. Vertebrate paleontology of the Cloverly Formation (Lower Cretaceous), I: faunal composition, biogeographic relationships, and sampling. Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology 33(2):264-292 DOI ↗
M. Huh, D.-G. Lee, and J.-K. Kim, J.-D. Lim, P. Godefroit. 2011. A new basal ornithopod dinosaur from the Upper Cretaceous of South Korea. Neues Jahrbuch für Geologie und Paläontologie Abhandlungen 259(1):1-24 DOI ↗
L. J. Krumenacker. 2010. Chronostratigraphy and Paleoecology of the Mid-Cretaceous Wayan Formation of Eastern Idaho, with a Description of the First Oryctodromeus Specimens from Idaho.
D. J. Varricchio, A. J. Martin, and Y. Katsura. 2007. First trace and body fossil evidence of a burrowing, denning dinosaur. Proceedings of the Royal Society of London B 274:1361-1368 DOI ↗
M. T. Carrano. 2006. Fossil Vertebrate Collections, Museum of the Rockies
P. M. Galton. 1995. The species of the basal hypsilophodontid dinosaur Thescelosaurus Gilmore (Ornithischia: Ornithopoda) from the Late Cretaceous of North America. Neues Jahrbuch für Geologie und Paläontologie, Abhandlungen 198(3):297-311 DOI ↗
K. F. Hirsch and B. Quinn. 1990. Eggs and eggshell fragments from the Upper Cretaceous Two Medicine Formation of Montana. Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology 10(4):491-511 DOI ↗
J. R. Horner and D. B. Weishampel. 1988. A comparative embryological study of two ornithischian dinosaurs. Nature 332:256-257 DOI ↗
M. Montellano. 1988. Alphadon halleyi (Didelphidae, Marsupialia) from the Two Medicine Formation (Late Cretaceous, Judithian) of Montana. Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology 8(4):378-382 DOI ↗
H.-D. Sues. 1980. Anatomy and relationships of a new hypsilophodontid dinosaur from the Lower Cretaceous of North America. Palaeontographica Abteilung A 169(1-3):51-72