''Deinogalerix'' (from

Ancient Greek Ancient Greek includes the forms of the Greek language used in ancient Greece and the ancient world from around 1500 BC to 300 BC. It is often roughly divided into the following periods: Mycenaean Greek (), Dark Ages (), the Archaic peri ...

, "terrible/terror" + ''

Galerix ''Galerix'' is a prehistoric genus of gymnures. Fossils of these hedgehog-like creatures are found in Europe, Africa, and Asia. Taxonomy Nine species are recognized as members of the genus: *''Galerix aurelianensis'' *''Galerix exilis'' *''Ga ...

'') is an extinct

genus Genus ( plural genera ) is a taxonomic rank used in the biological classification of extant taxon, living and fossil organisms as well as Virus classification#ICTV classification, viruses. In the hierarchy of biological classification, genus com ...

gymnure Gymnures, also called hairy hedgehogs or moonrats, are mammals belonging to the subfamily Galericinae, in the family Erinaceidae and the order Eulipotyphla. Gymnures resemble rats but are not closely related as they are not rodents; they are ...

which lived in

Italy Italy ( it, Italia ), officially the Italian Republic, ) or the Republic of Italy, is a country in Southern Europe. It is located in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea, and its territory largely coincides with the homonymous geographical re ...

in the

Late Miocene The Late Miocene (also known as Upper Miocene) is a sub-epoch of the Miocene epoch (geology), Epoch made up of two faunal stage, stages. The Tortonian and Messinian stages comprise the Late Miocene sub-epoch, which lasted from 11.63 Ma (million ye ...

, 7-10 million years ago. The genus was apparently

endemic Endemism is the state of a species being found in a single defined geographic location, such as an island, state, nation, country or other defined zone; organisms that are indigenous to a place are not endemic to it if they are also found elsew ...

to what was then the island of

Gargano Gargano (, Gargano Apulian Italo-Romance arˈgæːnə is a historical and geographical sub-region in the province of Foggia, Apulia, southeast Italy, consisting of a wide isolated mountain massif made of highland and several peaks and forming ...

, which is now a peninsula. The first specimens of ''Deinogalerix'' were first described in 1972. The genus is in the hedgehog

subfamily In biological classification, a subfamily (Latin: ', plural ') is an auxiliary (intermediate) taxonomic rank, next below family but more inclusive than genus. Standard nomenclature rules end subfamily botanical names with "-oideae", and zoologi ...

of gymnures or moon-rats, which are not rats at all, but rather hairy, superficially rat-like relatives of the hedgehog lacking quills. ''Deinogalerix'' had a long, thin, conical face, small pointed ears, a lengthy, tapering tail and long hairs. Deinogalerix koenigswaldi head

''Deinogalerix koenigswaldi''s skull was long and the entire body measured . It occupied the same

ecological niche In ecology, a niche is the match of a species to a specific environmental condition. Three variants of ecological niche are described by It describes how an organism or population responds to the distribution of resources and competitors (for ...

dog The dog (''Canis familiaris'' or ''Canis lupus familiaris'') is a domesticated descendant of the wolf. Also called the domestic dog, it is derived from the extinct Pleistocene wolf, and the modern wolf is the dog's nearest living relative. Do ...

s and cats today, except that it had more

predator Predation is a biological interaction where one organism, the predator, kills and eats another organism, its prey. It is one of a family of common feeding behaviours that includes parasitism and micropredation (which usually do not kill th ...

s itself - such as the enormous

barn owl The barn owl (''Tyto alba'') is the most widely distributed species of owl in the world and one of the most widespread of all species of birds, being found almost everywhere except for the polar and desert regions, Asia north of the Himalaya ...

Tyto gigantea ''Tyto gigantea'' is an extinct barn owl from what is now Gargano Gargano (, Gargano Apulian Italo-Romance arˈgæːnə is a historical and geographical sub-region in the province of Foggia, Apulia, southeast Italy, consisting of a wide is ...

''. It is believed that the species of ''Deinogalerix'' were

insectivore A robber fly eating a hoverfly An insectivore is a carnivorous animal or plant that eats insects. An alternative term is entomophage, which can also refer to the human practice of eating insects. The first vertebrate insectivores wer ...

s, mostly feeding off

invertebrate Invertebrates are a paraphyletic group of animals that neither possess nor develop a vertebral column (commonly known as a ''backbone'' or ''spine''), derived from the notochord. This is a grouping including all animals apart from the chordate ...

s like beetles, dragonflies and crickets, and possibly even snails. But the larger species may also have hunted small mammals, reptiles and birds. In the Late Miocene subepoch, what is at present Italy was mainly a group of small islands and only at a later date did majority of these join with the mainland. It is known that animals on these islands sometimes

evolved Evolution is change in the heritable characteristics of biological populations over successive generations. These characteristics are the expressions of genes, which are passed on from parent to offspring during reproduction. Variation t ...

quite differently from elsewhere. So it is possible that ''Deinogalerix'' may have lived exclusively in the Gargano.

References

External links

The deinogalerix and other prehistoric creatures

{{Taxonbar, from=Q138981 Gymnures Prehistoric Eulipotyphla Miocene mammals of Europe Prehistoric placental genera Fossil taxa described in 1972