A fast-moving, plant-eating dinosaur that roamed what is now Colorado around 150 million years ago has made its way across the Atlantic — its fossilized skeleton is now on public display for the first time this week at a museum in London.
E. mollyborthwickae, a newly unveiled dinosaur species, is now on display at London’s Natural History Museum, offering visitors a rare glimpse into life from 150 million years ago.
📍 © The Trustees of the Natural History Museum, London
About 150 million years ago, a fast, dog-sized dinosaur with oversized feet sprinted across what is now Colorado, weaving between Jurassic giants like Stegosaurus and Diplodocus in a prehistoric game of survival.
New Dinosaur Discovery: Enigmacursor mollyborthwickae Joins London’s Natural History Museum
A speedy, nimble dinosaur that once darted through the Late Jurassic landscape of what is now Colorado has officially been identified as a new species: Enigmacursor mollyborthwickae, researchers announced this week in the journal Royal Society Open Science.
The small, herbivorous dinosaur — roughly the size of a wallaby — lived around 150 million years ago, sharing its world with giants like Stegosaurus and Diplodocus. Despite its modest size, this agile creature played a crucial role in the ecosystem of its time.
Its fossilized skeleton, now on permanent display in the Earth Hall Mezzanine at London’s Natural History Museum, is the institution’s first new dinosaur exhibit since 2014, according to BBC News’ Georgina Rannard.
“E. mollyborthwickae represents one of the rarities from further down the food chain of the dinosaur era,”
said David Norman, a paleobiologist at the University of Cambridge, in an interview with New Scientist.
“It was clearly a small, wallaby-sized herbivore that scampered around the Late Jurassic countryside.”
The story of its discovery is as intriguing as the dinosaur itself. Between 2021 and 2022, fossil hunters uncovered the bones on private land in Moffat County, Colorado. The remains were sold through a commercial fossil dealer and eventually surfaced in a London art gallery, where they caught the attention of Natural History Museum paleobiologists Susannah Maidment and Paul Barrett.
Their research helped confirm that the skeleton belonged to a previously unknown species, adding an exciting new chapter to what we know about Jurassic-era biodiversity.
E. mollyborthwickae sprinted through the Late Jurassic on its oversized feet, using its small but nimble forearms to gather and eat vegetation — a swift, agile herbivore of its time.
Illustration by Bob Nicholls
From Mystery to Museum: How Enigmacursor mollyborthwickae Got Its Name
When researchers Susannah Maidment and Paul Barrett first encountered the partial dinosaur skeleton in a London art gallery, they were immediately intrigued. Working closely with the gallery, they secured support from Molly Borthwick, a generous donor who helped bring the remarkable specimen to the Natural History Museum.
In honor of her contribution, the dinosaur was officially named Enigmacursor mollyborthwickae — combining “Enigmacursor” (Latin for “mysterious runner”) with Borthwick’s name as a tribute.
Originally, the skeleton had been tentatively identified as a Nanosaurus, a small, plant-eating dinosaur first described in 1877. But as Maidment and Barrett examined the fossil in detail, it became clear that the Nanosaurus label was outdated and based on scant, poorly preserved remains — including simple bone impressions in sandstone. In the 19th century, when paleontology was still in its early days, almost every fossil seemed new and groundbreaking, even if the evidence was fragmentary.
“Back then, many dinosaurs were named on very limited material,” says Maidment.
“But today, with thousands more discoveries worldwide, we hold new species to a much higher standard.”
With more than a century of scientific advances under their belt, the researchers concluded that it was time to retire the Nanosaurus designation in this case. Instead, they introduced Enigmacursor as a brand-new genus and species, backed by stronger anatomical evidence and modern research methods.
A Hidden World of Small Dinosaurs
Against this backdrop, scientists believe that E. mollyborthwickae is likely just one of many small, overlooked dinosaurs — some misidentified in the past, others still buried beneath the surface or gathering dust in museum drawers. Even in well-explored fossil sites like the Morrison Formation — the same region that gave us iconic giants like Stegosaurus and Apatosaurus — smaller species often go unnoticed.
Why? Because paleontology, historically, has had a bias for the big and dramatic. Massive skeletons grab headlines and museum space, while petite, agile herbivores like E. mollyborthwickae have too often been understudied or lumped together with known species.
Now, with more refined techniques and renewed interest, scientists are revisiting old collections and looking at the ground with fresh eyes — in search of the forgotten dinosaurs that once filled the undergrowth of ancient landscapes.
