Anoplotheriidae 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 ...

family Family (from la, familia) is a Social group, group of people related either by consanguinity (by recognized birth) or Affinity (law), affinity (by marriage or other relationship). The purpose of the family is to maintain the well-being of its ...

of even-toed ungulates (

order Order, ORDER or Orders may refer to: * Categorization, the process in which ideas and objects are recognized, differentiated, and understood * Heterarchy, a system of organization wherein the elements have the potential to be ranked a number of d ...

Artiodactyla). They were

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 ...

Western Europe Western Europe is the western region of Europe. The region's countries and territories vary depending on context. The concept of "the West" appeared in Europe in juxtaposition to "the East" and originally applied to the ancient Mediterranean ...

during the

Eocene The Eocene ( ) Epoch is a geological epoch (geology), epoch that lasted from about 56 to 33.9 million years ago (mya). It is the second epoch of the Paleogene Period (geology), Period in the modern Cenozoic Era (geology), Era. The name ''Eocene' ...

and

Oligocene The Oligocene ( ) is a geologic epoch of the Paleogene Period and extends from about 33.9 million to 23 million years before the present ( to ). As with other older geologic periods, the rock beds that define the epoch are well identified but the ...

epochs about 48—23 million years ago (Mya), existing for about 25 million years. They disappeared at the end of the Oligocene, leaving no survivors today. Its name is derived from the grc, ἂνοπλος ("unarmed") and θήριον ("beast"), translating as "unarmed beast". They were most likely mid-sized terrestrial

herbivore A herbivore is an animal anatomically and physiologically adapted to eating plant material, for example foliage or marine algae, for the main component of its diet. As a result of their plant diet, herbivorous animals typically have mouthpart ...

s not too distantly related to

camel A camel (from: la, camelus and grc-gre, κάμηλος (''kamēlos'') from Hebrew or Phoenician: גָמָל ''gāmāl''.) is an even-toed ungulate in the genus ''Camelus'' that bears distinctive fatty deposits known as "humps" on its back. C ...

s, but smaller and low-slung with long and thick tails, and rather

generalist A generalist is a person with a wide array of knowledge on a variety of subjects, useful or not. It may also refer to: Occupations * a physician who provides general health care, as opposed to a medical specialist; see also: ** General pract ...

ic. The climate during their time was warmer than today, and their habitats were probably

subtropical The subtropical zones or subtropics are geographical zone, geographical and Köppen climate classification, climate zones to the Northern Hemisphere, north and Southern Hemisphere, south of the tropics. Geographically part of the Geographical z ...

or even

tropical The tropics are the regions of Earth surrounding the Equator. They are defined in latitude by the Tropic of Cancer in the Northern Hemisphere at N and the Tropic of Capricorn in the Southern Hemisphere at S. The tropics are also referred to ...

, with plentiful rainfall and abundant vegetation.

Tropical rainforest Tropical rainforests are rainforests that occur in areas of tropical rainforest climate in which there is no dry season – all months have an average precipitation of at least 60 mm – and may also be referred to as ''lowland equatori ...

may at least initially have occurred all over the Anoplotheriidae's range. Ecologically, they may have resembled a large

duiker A duiker is a small to medium-sized brown antelope native to sub-Saharan Africa, found in heavily wooded areas. The 22 extant species, including three sometimes considered to be subspecies of the other species, form the subfamily Cephalophina ...

of our time (e.g. the similarly sized

yellow-backed duiker The yellow-backed duiker (''Cephalophus silvicultor'') is a forest dwelling antelope in the order Artiodactyla from the family Bovidae. Yellow-backed duikers are the most widely distributed of all duikers. They are found mainly in Central and West ...

''Cephalophus silvicultor''), foraging in dense growth where their low builds would have been advantageous.

Systematics and taxonomy

The family Anoplotheriidae was assigned to Tesserachenae by Gray in 1821, to Belluae by Bonaparte (who named it Anoplotheriina) in 1850; to Artiodactyla by Cope in 1889, to

Ruminantia Ruminants ( suborder Ruminantia) are hoofed herbivorous grazing or browsing mammals that are able to acquire nutrients from plant-based food by fermenting it in a specialized stomach prior to digestion, principally through microbial actions. The ...

by Gregory in 1910, and finally to its own

superfamily SUPERFAMILY is a database and search platform of structural and functional annotation for all proteins and genomes. It classifies amino acid sequences into known structural domains, especially into SCOP superfamilies. Domains are functional, str ...

Anoplotherioidea by Romer in 1966.J. J. Hooker. 1986. Mammals from the Bartonian (middle/late Eocene) of the Hampshire Basin, southern England. Bulletin of the British Museum (Natural History) 39(4):191-478 Here, the Anoplotherioidea are also considered to include the

Cainotheriidae Cainotheriidae is an extinct family of artiodactyls known from the Late Eocene to Middle Miocene of Europe. They are mostly found preserved in karstic deposits. These animals were small in size, and generally did not exceed in height at the s ...

and Dacrytheriidae. Other authors treat the former as more distantly related and sometimes include the Dacrytheriidae in the Anoplotheriidae as a third subfamily, Dacrytheriinae. On the other hand, the Robiaciinae can be considered the most

basal Basal or basilar is a term meaning ''base'', ''bottom'', or ''minimum''. Science * Basal (anatomy), an anatomical term of location for features associated with the base of an organism or structure * Basal (medicine), a minimal level that is nec ...

branch of the Anoplotheriinae, resulting in no subfamilies at all being recognized, or be elevated to a fourth (or third) family in the Anoplotherioidea. The

subfamilies 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 ...

and

genera Genus ( plural genera ) is a taxonomic rank used in the biological classification of living and fossil organisms as well as viruses. In the hierarchy of biological classification, genus comes above species and below family. In binomial nomenclat ...

included here are: Subfamily Robiaciinae Sudre, 1977 (

; disputed) * Genus '' Robiacina'' Sudre, 1969 Subfamily Anoplotheriinae Gray, 1821 (advanced) * Genus '' Anoplotherium'' * Genus '' Deilotherium'' Filhol, 1882 * Genus '' Diplartiopus'' (tentatively placed here) * Genus '' Diplobune'' Rutimeyer, 1862 * Genus '' Duerotherium'' * Genus '' Ephelcomenus'' Hurzeler, 1938 * Genus '' Hyracodontherium'' (tentatively placed here) * Genus '' Robiatherium'' Sudre, 1988

References

Sources

* http://www.helsinki.fi/~mhaaramo/metazoa/deuterostoma/chordata/synapsida/eutheria/artiodactyla/suina/anoplotheroidea.html {{Taxonbar, from=Q567678 Tylopoda Eocene even-toed ungulates Eocene first appearances Prehistoric mammals of Europe Rupelian extinctions Prehistoric mammal families