''Ramadapis sahnii'' was a primitive

primate Primates are a diverse order (biology), order of mammals. They are divided into the Strepsirrhini, strepsirrhines, which include the lemurs, galagos, and lorisids, and the Haplorhini, haplorhines, which include the Tarsiiformes, tarsiers and ...

belonging to Sivaladapidae that existed around 11 to 14 million years ago ( Early to Mid-Miocene). Only a

mandible In anatomy, the mandible, lower jaw or jawbone is the largest, strongest and lowest bone in the human facial skeleton. It forms the lower jaw and holds the lower teeth in place. The mandible sits beneath the maxilla. It is the only movable bon ...

(a lower jaw bone) was found at the dig site, which was near Ramnagar in

Udhampur district Udhampur is a district in the Indian Union territory of Jammu and Kashmir. Covering an area of in the Himalayan mountains, the district has its headquarters in the town of Udhampur. The Northern Command headquarters of the Indian Army is loc ...

in Jammu and Kashmir specifically the lower Siwalik deposits. The jawbone indicates that ''Ramadapis'' resembled a modern day

ring-tailed lemur The ring-tailed lemur (''Lemur catta'') is a large strepsirrhine primate and the most recognized lemur due to its long, black and white ringed tail. It belongs to Lemuridae, one of five lemur families, and is the only member of the ''Lemur'' g ...

. The early

lemur Lemurs ( ) (from Latin ''lemures'' – ghosts or spirits) are wet-nosed primates of the superfamily Lemuroidea (), divided into 8 families and consisting of 15 genera and around 100 existing species. They are endemic to the island of Madaga ...

was named after

Ashok Sahni Ashoka (, ; also ''Asoka''; 304 – 232 BCE), popularly known as Ashoka the Great, was the third emperor of the Maurya Empire of Indian subcontinent during to 232 BCE. His empire covered a large part of the Indian subcontinent, s ...

, who discovered the first sivaladapid in the Siwalik deposits. The

was only around one and a quarter inch long, which led scientists to assume that it was only around 11 pounds.

Ecology

The environment that ''Ramadapis sahnii'' lived in is highly disputed upon. It has been hypothesized to either be a woodland, a grassland with few trees, a humid tropical forest, and finally a sort of half grassland and woodland.

References

Prehistoric strepsirrhines Miocene primates of Asia Primates of South Asia Taxa described in 2017 {{Primate-stub