Embrithopoda

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Order of extinct placental mammals

title: "Embrithopoda" type: doc version: 1 created: 2026-02-28 author: "Wikipedia contributors" status: active scope: public tags: ["embrithopods", "eocene-mammals", "oligocene-mammals", "rupelian-extinctions"] description: "Order of extinct placental mammals" topic_path: "general/embrithopods" source: "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Embrithopoda" license: "CC BY-SA 4.0" wikipedia_page_id: 0 wikipedia_revision_id: 0

::summary Order of extinct placental mammals ::

| fossil_range = Paleocene - Oligocene, | image = Arsinoitherium zitteli.jpg | image_caption = Arsinoitherium zitteli | display_parents = 3 | taxon = Embrithopoda | authority = | subdivision_ranks = Families | subdivision = * †Stylolophus

Embrithopoda ("heavy-footed" in Ancient Greek) is an order of extinct paenungulate mammals known from Asia, Africa and Eastern Europe. Most of the embrithopod genera are known exclusively from jaws and teeth dated from the late Paleocene to the late Eocene; however, the order is best known from its terminal member, the large Arsinoitherium.

Description

While embrithopods bore a superficial resemblance to rhinoceroses, their horns had bony cores covered in keratinized skin. Not all embrithopods possessed horns, either. Despite their appearance, they have been regarded as related to elephants or sirenians, not perissodactyls.{{Cite web | title = Introduction to the Embrithopoda | publisher = University of California Museum of Paleontology | url = http://www.ucmp.berkeley.edu/mammal/mesaxonia/embrithopoda.html | access-date = 7 March 2013}}

Origins and distribution

As tethytheres, the Embrithopoda have been believed to be part of the clade Afrotheria. However, a study of the basal arsinoitheriid, Palaeoamasia, suggests that embrithopods are not tethytheres or even paenungulates, and that they need to be better sampled in an analysis of eutherian relationships to clarify if they are afrotherians. It is also not clear if embrithopods originated in Africa or Eurasia. However, recent findings demonstrate an African origin for embrithopods and furthermore a relationship with other paenungulates, albeit having diverged earlier than previously thought.

Fossils of embrithopods, such as Arsinoitherium, have been found in Egypt, Ethiopia, Kenya, Morocco, Mongolia, Turkey, Romania, Namibia, Tunisia and Croatia. Until the 1970s, only Arsinoitherium itself was known, appearing isolated in the fossil record.

Classification

and considered Phenacolophus from Mongolia a primitive embrithopod, although this attribution was challenged by several other authors. A 2016 cladistic study found Phenacolophus as a stem-perissodactyl and the embrithopods at the base of Altungulata. More recently, an afrothere identity has been vindicated, albeit more basal than previously assumed.

Order Embrithopoda sensu Prothero & Schoch 1989 (=Barypoda Andrews 1904)

Notes

References

  • {{Cite journal | last = Andrews | first = C.W. | author-link = Charles William Andrews | title = Further notes on the mammals of the Eocene of Egypt | year = 1904 | journal = Geological Magazine | volume = 1 | issue = 4 | pages = 157–162 | doi = 10.1017/S0016756800119491 | bibcode = 1904GeoM....1..157A | oclc = 4668923377 | url = https://zenodo.org/record/1687665 }}
  • {{Cite book | last = Andrews | first = C.W. | title = A descriptive catalogue of the Tertiary Vertebrata of the Fayûm, Egypt | year = 1906 | location = London | publisher = British Museum | oclc = 3675777 }}
  • {{Cite book | last = Beadnell | first = H.J.C. | title = A preliminary note on Arsinoitherium zitteli Beadnell, from the Upper Eocene strata of Egypt | year = 1902 | publisher = Egyptian Survey Department, Public Works Ministry | location = Cairo | oclc = 20609512 }}
  • {{Cite journal | last = Court | first = N. | year = 1990 | journal = Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology | volume = 10 | issue = 2 | pages = 170–82 | title = Periotic anatomy of Arsinoitherium (Mammalia, Embrithopoda) and its phylogenetic implications | oclc = 4899524631 | doi=10.1080/02724634.1990.10011806}}
  • {{Cite book | last1 = McKenna | first1 = Malcolm C. | last2 = Bell | first2 = Susan K. | title = Classification of Mammals Above the Species Level | year = 1997 | publisher = Columbia University Press | location = New York | isbn = 0231110138 | oclc = 37345734 }}
  • {{Cite journal | last1 = McKenna | first1 = M.C. | last2 = Manning | first2 = E. | title = Affinities and palaeobiogeographic significance of the Mongolian Paleogene genus Phenacolophus | year = 1977 | journal = Geobios| volume = 10 |issue= Suppl 1| pages = 61–85 | doi = 10.1016/S0016-6995(77)80008-9 | oclc = 4656767437}}
  • {{Cite book | last = Ozansoy | first = Fikret | title = Türkiye Senozoik çağlarında fosil insan formu problemi ve biostratigrafik dayanakları | year = 1966 | publisher = Ankara University Press | series = A.Ü. D.T.C.F. (University of Ankara, Faculty of Languages, History and Geography Publications) | volume = 172 | pages = 1–104 | oclc = 16763756 }}
  • {{Cite journal | last1 = Radulesco | first1 = C. | last2 = Iliesco | first2 = G. | last3 = Iliesco | first3 = M. | title = Decouverte d'un Embrithopode nouveau (Mammalia) dans la Paléogène de la dépression de Hateg (Roumanie) et considération générales sur la géologie de la région | year = 1976 | journal = Neues Jahrbuch für Geologie und Paläontologie - Monatshefte | volume = 1 | issue = 11 | pages = 690–698
  • {{Cite journal | last1 = Radulesco | first1 = C. | last2 = Sudre | first2 = J. | title = Crivadiatherium iliescui n. sp., nouvel Embrithopode (Mammalia) dans le Paléogène ancien de la depression de Hateg (Roumanie) | year = 1985 | journal = Palaeovertebrata | volume = 15 | issue = 3 | pages = 139–57
  • {{Cite book | last = Rose | first = Kenneth David | title = The beginning of the age of mammals | year = 2006 | publisher = JHU Press | location = Baltimore | url = https://books.google.com/books?id=3bs0D5ix4VAC | isbn = 0801884721 }}
  • {{Cite book | last1 = Rose | first1 = Kenneth D. | last2 = Archibald | first2 = J. David | title = The Rise of Placental Mammals: Origins and Relationships of the Major Extant Clades | year = 2005 | publisher = JHU Press | url = https://books.google.com/books?id=DhchVG_rbQ8C&pg=PA97 | access-date = 28 April 2013 | isbn = 9780801880223 | oclc = 55801049 }}
  • {{Cite journal | last1 = Sanders | first1 = William J | last2 = Kappelman | first2 = John | last3 = Rasmussen | first3 = D Tab | title = New large-bodied mammals from the Late Oligocene site of Chilga, Ethiopia | year = 2004 | journal = Acta Palaeontologica Polonica | volume = 49 | issue = 3 | url = http://www.app.pan.pl/article/item/app49-365.html?pdf=39 | format = PDF | oclc = 716778291 }}
  • {{Cite journal | last1 = Şen | first1 = Ş. | last2 = Heintz | first2 = E. | title = Palaeoamasia kansui Ozansoy 1966, embrithopode (Mammalia) de l'Eocene de Anatolie | year = 1979 | journal = Annales de paléontologie (Vértébres) | volume = 65 | issue = 1 | pages = 73–91

References

  1. Emmanuel Gheerbrant; Arnaud Schmitt; László Kocsis (2018). "Early African fossils elucidate the origin of embrithopod mammals". Current Biology. Online edition. doi:10.1016/j.cub.2018.05.032.
  2. {{Harvnb. Rose. 2006
  3. {{Harvnb. Rose. 2006
  4. {{Paleodb. 43309. Embrithopoda. Retrieved March 2013.
  5. (2016). "New material of ''Palaeoamasia kansui'' (Embrithopoda, Mammalia) from the Eocene of Turkey and a phylogenetic analysis of Embrithopoda at the species level". Palaeontology.
  6. (July 2018). "Early African fossils elucidate the origin of embrithopod mammals". Current Biology.
  7. (2008). "Mammalia from the Lutetian of Namibia". Memoir of the Geological Survey of Namibia.
  8. (2013). "Discovery of an embrithopod mammal (''Arsinoitherium''?) in the late Eocene of Tunisia". Journal of African Earth Sciences.
  9. [https://www.rabdanas.com/index.php/vijesti/item/7241-dan-georaznolikosti-na-rabu-obiljezen-medunarodnim-simpozijem-geopark-and-sciences/ Rab danas]
  10. Koenigswald, W. v.. (2012). "Unique differentiation of radial enamel in Arsinoitherium (Embrithopoda, Tethytheria)". Historical Biology.
  11. {{Harvnb. Radulesco. Sudre. 1985; {{Harvnb. Maas. Thewissen. Kappelman. 1998. Rose. Archibald. 2005
  12. Haaramo, Mikko. (2007). "''†Embrithopoda - arsinoitheres''".

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embrithopodseocene-mammalsoligocene-mammalsrupelian-extinctions