Anthracobunidae

Quality 0.50 · 2 views · Updated 2 months ago

Extinct family of mammals

title: "Anthracobunidae" type: doc version: 1 created: 2026-02-28 author: "Wikipedia contributors" status: active scope: public tags: ["anthracobunidae", "panperissodactyla", "prehistoric-perissodactyla", "eocene-perissodactyla", "prehistoric-mammal-families"] description: "Extinct family of mammals" topic_path: "general/anthracobunidae" source: "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anthracobunidae" license: "CC BY-SA 4.0" wikipedia_page_id: 0 wikipedia_revision_id: 0

::summary Extinct family of mammals ::

†Anthracobune
†Jozaria
†Obergfellia ::figure[src="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/aa/Cooper_et_al._parsimony_analyses_consensus_tree_for_anthracobunid_phylogeny.png" caption="Parsimony analyses consensus tree for phylogeny of anthracobunids from cladistic study by Cooper ''et al.'' (2014), showing them (near the bottom) placed within [[Perissodactyla]] next to [[Desmostylia]]."] ::

Anthracobunidae is an extinct family of stem perissodactyls that lived in the early to middle Eocene period. They were originally considered to be a paraphyletic family of primitive proboscideans possibly ancestral to the Moeritheriidae and the desmostylians. The family has also thought to be ancestral to the Sirenia.{{Cite journal | last1 = Wells | first1 = N.A. | last2 = Gingerich | first2 = P.D. | author2-link = Philip D. Gingerich | title = Review of Eocene Anthracobunidae (Mammalia, Proboscidea) with a new genus and species, Jozaria palustris, from the Kuldana Formation of Kohat (Pakistan) | year = 1983 | journal = Contrib. Mus. Pal. Univ. Michigan | volume = 26 | issue = 7 | pages = 117–139 | url = http://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/handle/2027.42/48515/ID367.pdf | oclc = 742731409}}

They superficially resemble the Moeritheriidae in both size and cheek tooth morphology, but lack their characteristic tusks. They were relatively small, ranging in size from 1 to 2 m in length. They are known only from fragmentary remains (mainly teeth) from Eocene deposits of the northwestern part of the Indian subcontinent. Recently excavated fossils with well-preserved jaws and teeth demonstrate that these animals were either perissodactyls{{cite web | last = Qiu | first = L. | title = Ancient "Oddball" Mammal Reshuffles Family Tree? | publisher = National Geographic Society | date = 2014-10-08 | url = http://newswatch.nationalgeographic.com/2014/10/08/animals-science-paleontology-fossils-evolution-rhinoceroses-elephants/ | access-date = 2014-10-11 | archive-date = 2014-10-11 | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20141011071917/http://newswatch.nationalgeographic.com/2014/10/08/animals-science-paleontology-fossils-evolution-rhinoceroses-elephants/}} or else part of a more primitive sister group to the perissodactyls. The anthracobunids were probably amphibious and lived in marshy environments. Analyses of stable isotopes and long bone geometry suggest most anthracobunids fed on terrestrial vegetation, but lived near water. The same cladistic analyses that prompted their new placement also imply that the semiaquatic marine desmostylians, another putative non-African afrotherian group, were closely related to the anthracobunids.

Notes

References

(2014-10-08). "Anthracobunids from the Middle Eocene of India and Pakistan Are Stem Perissodactyls". PLOS ONE.
{{Paleodb. 43232. Anthracobunidae. Retrieved July 2013.
Gheerbrant, E. (2005). "The Rise of Placental Mammals: Origins and Relationships of the Major Extant Clades". Johns Hopkins University Press.
(2019). "Anatomy, relationships, and paleobiology of ''Cambaytherium'' (Mammalia, Perissodactylamorpha, Anthracobunia) from the Lower Eocene of western India". Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology.

::callout[type=info title="Wikipedia Source"] This article was imported from Wikipedia and is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Content has been adapted to SurfDoc format. Original contributors can be found on the article history page. ::