''Sarcophilus'' is a genus of

carnivorous marsupial Dasyuromorphia (, meaning "hairy tail" in Greek) is an order comprising most of the Australian carnivorous marsupials, including quolls, dunnarts, the numbat, the Tasmanian devil, and the thylacine. In Australia, the exceptions include the o ...

best known for its only living member, the

Tasmanian devil The Tasmanian devil (''Sarcophilus harrisii'') (palawa kani: purinina) is a carnivorous marsupial of the family Dasyuridae. Until recently, it was only found on the island state of Tasmania, but it has been reintroduced to New South Wales in ...

. Sarcophilus is Latin - meaning 'flesh-loving'. There are four species of ''Sarcophilus''. '' S. laniarius'' and '' S. moornaensis'' are only known from fossils from the

Pleistocene The Pleistocene ( , often referred to as the ''Ice age'') is the geological Epoch (geology), epoch that lasted from about 2,580,000 to 11,700 years ago, spanning the Earth's most recent period of repeated glaciations. Before a change was fina ...

. ''S. laniarius'' was larger than the contemporary, and only surviving, species '' S. harrisii'', weighing up to 10 kilograms more. The relationship between the four species is unclear; while some have proposed that ''S. harrisii'' may be a

dwarf Dwarf or dwarves may refer to: Common uses *Dwarf (folklore), a being from Germanic mythology and folklore * Dwarf, a person or animal with dwarfism Arts, entertainment, and media Fictional entities * Dwarf (''Dungeons & Dragons''), a humanoid ...

version of ''S. laniarius'', others argue that it is a completely different species and that the two may have coexisted during the Pleistocene.

References

* Long, J., Archer, M., Flannery, T. and Hand, S. 2002. ''Prehistoric Mammals of Australia and New Guinea: One Hundred Million Years of Evolution''. Johns Hopkins University Press. pp 55. . Dasyuromorphs Marsupial genera Mammal genera with one living species Extant Pleistocene first appearances Taxa named by Frédéric Cuvier {{Marsupial-stub