''Nototherium'' ("Southern Beast") is an

extinct Extinction is the termination of a kind of organism or of a group of kinds (taxon), usually a species. The moment of extinction is generally considered to be the death of the last individual of the species, although the capacity to breed and ...

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 ...

diprotodontid The Diprotodontidae are an extinct family of large herbivorous marsupials, endemic to Australia and New Guinea during the Oligocene through Pleistocene periods from 28.4 million to 40,000 years ago. The family consisted of large quadrupedal te ...

marsupial Marsupials are any members of the mammalian infraclass Marsupialia. All extant marsupials are endemic to Australasia, Wallacea and the Americas. A distinctive characteristic common to most of these species is that the young are carried in a po ...

from

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a Sovereign state, sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous List of islands of Australia, sma ...

and

New Guinea New Guinea (; Hiri Motu Hiri Motu, also known as Police Motu, Pidgin Motu, or just Hiri, is a language of Papua New Guinea, which is spoken in surrounding areas of Port Moresby (Capital of Papua New Guinea). It is a simplified version of ...

. This mammal had

hypsodont Hypsodont is a pattern of dentition with high-crowned teeth and enamel extending past the gum line, providing extra material for wear and tear. Some examples of animals with hypsodont dentition are cows and horses; all animals that feed on gritt ...

molars and weighed around 500kg.Ross D.E. MacPhee, Hans-Dieter Sues, 1999, Extinctions in Near Time, p.251, Springer Science & Business Media It was a relative of the larger ''

Diprotodon ''Diprotodon'' (Ancient Greek: "two protruding front teeth") is an extinct genus of marsupial from the Pleistocene of Australia, containing one species, ''D. optatum''. The earliest finds date to 1.77 million to 780,000 years ago, but most speci ...

'' and a distant kin to modern

wombat Wombats are short-legged, muscular quadrupedal marsupials that are native to Australia. They are about in length with small, stubby tails and weigh between . All three of the extant species are members of the family Vombatidae. They are adap ...

Species

* ''Nototherium inerme'' Owen, 1845 * ''Nototherium watutense'' Anderson, 1937 (formerly considered to be a member of ''

Kolopsis ''Kolopsis'' is an extinct genus of diprotodontid marsupials from Australia and Papua New Guinea. It contains three species, although ''K. rotundus'' may be more closely related to other zygomaturines than to ''Kolopsis''. *†''Kolopsis rotu ...

'') Plio-Pleistocene, New Guinea. * ''Nototherium mitchelli'' Owen, 1845 Pleistocene, Australia (possibly a junior synonym of ''N. inerme'')

References

* ''Wildlife of Gondwana: Dinosaurs and Other Vertebrates from the Ancient Supercontinent (Life of the Past)'' by Pat Vickers Rich, Thomas Hewitt Rich, Francesco Coffa, and Steven Morton * ''Prehistoric Mammals of Australia and New Guinea: One Hundred Million Years of Evolution'' by John A. Long, Michael Archer, Timothy Flannery, and Suzanne Hand Nothotherium mitchelli

Pleistocene marsupials Pliocene marsupials Prehistoric vombatiforms Prehistoric mammals of Australia Prehistoric marsupial genera Fossil taxa described in 1845 Taxa named by Richard Owen {{paleo-marsupial-stub