Zalmoxes life

Zalmoxes (named after the Thracian deity "Zalmoxis", whose supposed resurrection is likened to the excavation of this dinosaur's remains) is a genus of rhabdodontid ornithopod dinosaur that lived on Hațeg Island, an area which would eventually become a basin within modern-day Romania, 70 – 66 million years ago, during the Maastrichtian Stage of the Late Cretaceous Period. Zalmoxes was a fairly small animal, with the type species Z. robustus growing to a maximum length of 2.5 meters (8 feet, 3 inches), and weighed no more than 45 kilograms (100 pounds). As indicated by its species name, "robustus", Zalmoxes has a stout body that is more heavily-built than its relatives. Like most of the inhabitants of Hațeg Island, Zalmoxes is believed to be subjected to insular dwarfism. However, as brought up by Dr. Darren Naish, lead consultant of Prehistoric Planet, it is possible that Zalmoxes simply inherited the standard diminutive size of its ancestors, with its status as a dwarf being questioned since at least 2005; instead of evolving a shrunken body size in response to its island habitat, Zalmoxes may have instead relied on growing slowly for an extended period of time, as indicated by analysis of its bones. A 2012 study also concluded that rhabdodontids really were small to begin with, and that some species like Rhabdodon itself actually attained their larger sizes due to gigantism