The Queen of Sheba's gazelle or Yemen gazelle (''Gazella bilkis''), 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 ...

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 gazelle. It was sometimes regarded as a subspecies of the

Arabian gazelle The Arabian gazelle ''(Gazella arabica)'' is a species of gazelle from the Arabian Peninsula. Taxonomy Until recently, it was only known from a single lectotype specimen mistakenly thought to have been collected on the Farasan Islands in the Red ...

, which is no longer a valid species. It was found on the mountains and hillsides in

Yemen Yemen (; ar, ٱلْيَمَن, al-Yaman), officially the Republic of Yemen,, ) is a country in Western Asia. It is situated on the southern end of the Arabian Peninsula, and borders Saudi Arabia to the Saudi Arabia–Yemen border, north and ...

, but none have been sighted since 1951, when five specimens were collected in mountains near Ta'izz, where it was reportedly common at the time. Surveys in the area of their former occurrence have failed to find any sign of its presence.Mallon, D.P. and Al-Safadi, M. 2001.Yemen. In: D.P. Mallon and S.C. Kingswood (compilers). 2001. Antelopes. Part 4: North Africa, the Middle East, and Asia. Global Survey and Regional Action Plans, pp. 63-68. IUCN, Gland. In 1985, a photograph of gazelles was taken in a private collection, Al Wabra Wildlife Farm, in

Qatar Qatar (, ; ar, قطر, Qaṭar ; local vernacular pronunciation: ), officially the State of Qatar,) is a country in Western Asia. It occupies the Qatar Peninsula on the northeastern coast of the Arabian Peninsula in the Middle East; it sh ...

. Zoologist

Colin Groves Colin Peter Groves (24 June 1942 – 30 November 2017) was a British-Australian biologist and anthropologist. Groves was Professor of Biological Anthropology at the Australian National University in Canberra, Australia. Education Born in Englan ...

claims these could possibly be surviving Queen of Sheba's gazelles.Research in Arabia, 1987 and 1992: visits to King Khalid and National Wildlife Research Centres (Saudi Arabia), Al Wabra Wildlife Farm (Qatar), Al-Areen Wildlife Park and Reserve (Bahrain) and Al Ain Zoo (United Arab Emirates). Downloaded on 29 December 2006 from It is not confirmed whether these animals truly belong to this species. The cause of extinction is still uncertain.

References

Gazella Extinct mammals of Asia Mammal extinctions since 1500 Mammals of the Arabian Peninsula Mammals described in 1985 {{eventoedungulate-stub