''Ceratotherium mauritanicum'' is a

species In biology, a species is the basic unit of classification and a taxonomic rank of an organism, as well as a unit of biodiversity. A species is often defined as the largest group of organisms in which any two individuals of the appropriate s ...

of fossil African

rhinoceros A rhinoceros (; ; ), commonly abbreviated to rhino, is a member of any of the five extant species (or numerous extinct species) of odd-toed ungulates in the family Rhinocerotidae. (It can also refer to a member of any of the extinct species ...

found in the

Late Pliocene Late may refer to: * LATE, an acronym which could stand for: ** Limbic-predominant age-related TDP-43 encephalopathy, a proposed form of dementia ** Local-authority trading enterprise, a New Zealand business law ** Local average treatment effect, ...

to earliest

Holocene The Holocene ( ) is the current geological epoch. It began approximately 11,650 cal years Before Present (), after the Last Glacial Period, which concluded with the Holocene glacial retreat. The Holocene and the preceding Pleistocene togeth ...

Morocco Morocco (),, ) officially the Kingdom of Morocco, is the westernmost country in the Maghreb region of North Africa. It overlooks the Mediterranean Sea to the north and the Atlantic Ocean to the west, and has land borders with Algeria t ...

Tunisia ) , image_map = Tunisia location (orthographic projection).svg , map_caption = Location of Tunisia in northern Africa , image_map2 = , capital = Tunis , largest_city = capital , ...

, and

Algeria ) , image_map = Algeria (centered orthographic projection).svg , map_caption = , image_map2 = , capital = Algiers , coordinates = , largest_city = capital , relig ...

. Slightly older fossils from the

Pliocene The Pliocene ( ; also Pleiocene) is the epoch in the geologic time scale that extends from 5.333 million to 2.58eastern Africa East Africa, Eastern Africa, or East of Africa, is the eastern subregion of the African continent. In the United Nations Statistics Division scheme of geographic regions, 10-11-(16*) territories make up Eastern Africa: Due to the historica ...

were also proposed to belong to this species, but it has been considered to belong to a somewhat more primitive species, ''Ceratotherium efficax''. A 2020 study considers ''C. efficax'' to be the same species as ''C. mauritanicum'', however.

Evolution

The

phylogenetic In biology, phylogenetics (; from Greek φυλή/ φῦλον [] "tribe, clan, race", and wikt:γενετικός, γενετικός [] "origin, source, birth") is the study of the evolutionary history and relationships among or within groups o ...

position of ''C. mauritanicum'' is somewhat disputed. One model see it as to be located in a direct line of ancestry between the primitive ''

Ceratotherium neumayri ''Ceratotherium neumayri'' is a fossil species of rhinoceros from the eastern Mediterranean, in the Anatolia region in modern Turkey, dating to the late Miocene. It is the likely ancestor of both the white rhinoceros and black rhinoceros lineages ...

'' and the living

white rhinoceros The white rhinoceros, white rhino or square-lipped rhinoceros (''Ceratotherium simum'') is the largest extant species of rhinoceros. It has a wide mouth used for grazing and is the most social of all rhino species. The white rhinoceros consists ...

(''Ceratotherium simum''). Alternatively it was proposed to be the descendant of ''Ceratotherium efficax'' and an extinct

sister taxon In phylogenetics, a sister group or sister taxon, also called an adelphotaxon, comprises the closest relative(s) of another given unit in an evolutionary tree. Definition The expression is most easily illustrated by a cladogram: Taxon A and ...

to '' C. simum''. It retained primitive characters contemporaneously to the more progressive evolution of the genus '' Ceratotherium'' in eastern and

southern Africa Southern Africa is the southernmost subregion of the African continent, south of the Congo and Tanzania. The physical location is the large part of Africa to the south of the extensive Congo River basin. Southern Africa is home to a number o ...

Distribution

''C. mauritanicum'' was widely distributed across northwestern Africa during the Quaternary, and often associated with archaeological sites.

Petroglyphs A petroglyph is an image created by removing part of a rock surface by incising, picking, carving, or abrading, as a form of rock art. Outside North America, scholars often use terms such as "carving", "engraving", or other descriptions ...

in northern Africa occasionally depict rhinoceri but often are too schematic to allow a distinction of the figured species. Those showing characters typical of the

may in fact represent ''C. mauritanicum'' instead of ''C. simum'', which may have been very similar in external appearance in life. It vanished during the Mesolithic and currently there is no evidence that it eventually survived into the historical era.

Paleoecology

''C. mauritanicum'' is supposed to have had an ecology very similar to the extant ''C. simum''. It lived in open savannah landscapes with sufficient water and vegetation, a biome that has vanished from the

Maghreb The Maghreb (; ar, الْمَغْرِب, al-Maghrib, lit=the west), also known as the Arab Maghreb ( ar, المغرب العربي) and Northwest Africa, is the western part of North Africa and the Arab world. The region includes Algeria, ...

since the

Early Holocene In the geologic time scale, the Greenlandian is the earliest age or lowest stage of the Holocene Epoch or Series, part of the Quaternary. Beginning in 11,650 BP (9701 BCE or 300 HE) and ending 8,276 BP (6237 BCE or 3764 HE), it is the earlie ...

. Its food was probably dominated by

grass Poaceae () or Gramineae () is a large and nearly ubiquitous family of monocotyledonous flowering plants commonly known as grasses. It includes the cereal grasses, bamboos and the grasses of natural grassland and species cultivated in lawns a ...

References

Pliocene mammals of Africa Pleistocene mammals of Africa Pliocene rhinoceroses Pleistocene rhinoceroses Fossil taxa described in 1888 {{paleo-oddtoedungulate-stub