User:PrimalMustelid/sandbox
PrimalMustelid/sandbox Temporal range:
| |
---|---|
Plagiolophus skeleton | |
Scientific classification | |
Domain: | Eukaryota |
Kingdom: | Animalia |
Phylum: | Chordata |
Class: | Mammalia |
Order: | Perissodactyla |
Family: | †Palaeotheriidae |
Genus: | †Plagiolophus Pomel, 1847 |
Type species | |
†Palaeotherium minus (= †Plagiolophus minor) Cuvier, 1804
| |
Other species | |
|
Research history
[edit]Early history
[edit]In 1804, the French naturalist Georges Cuvier, having established the genus Palaeotherium and some of its species (P. medium and P. magnum), recognized a third species P. minus based on some postcranial fossils from the gypsum quarries of the outskirts of Paris (known as the Paris Basin), although he did not elaborate further on them.[1] In a later journal of the same year, he described a nearly completely skeleton from the quarries of the French commune of Pantin, originally found by the French naturalist Auguste Nicholas de Saint-Genis. According to Cuvier, the quarry workers previously thought the skeleton to be of a ram, and it was presented as such in public newspapers. The French prefect Nicolas Frochot later acquired it and brought it to the National Museum of Natural History, France, where Cuvier was then able to observe that it must have been a skeleton of a Palaeotherium species. He noted that the majority of the fossil bones were detached from others and/or damaged but that postcranial fossils such as scapulae, humeri, femora, vertebrae, and ribs were found. The naturalist also provided a figure of the skeleton within the journal.[2]
In 1812, Cuvier published published his drawing of a skeletal reconstruction of P. minus based on known fossil remains of the species including the mostly complete skeleton. He also suggested theoretical lifestyles of several Palaeotherium species. In particular, he suggested that P. minus resembled a tapir, was smaller than a sheep, and was cursorial based on the slender morphologies of its leg bones. Such a behaviour and small size would have differed from other species of Palaeotherium, several of which according to Cuvier had stockier limb bone builds. He also identified that P. medium, P. magnum, P. minus, P. crassum, and P. curtum were all tridactyl, or three-toed.[3][4]
References
[edit]- ^ Cuvier, Georges (1804). "Suite des Recherches: Suite de recherches sur les os fossiles de la pierre à plâtre des environs de Paris. Troisième mémoire. Restitution des pieds. Première section. Restitution des différens pieds de derrière". Annales du Muséum National d'Histoire Naturelle, Paris (in French). 3: 442–472. Archived from the original on 2023-07-27.
- ^ Cuvier, Georges (1804). "Suite de recherches sur les os fossiles de la pierre à plâtre des environs de Paris. Cinquiéme Mémoire. Sur les os du Tronc. Premiére Section. Description d'un squelette presque entier trouvé dans les carriéres de Pantin". Annales du Muséum National d'Histoire Naturelle, Paris (in French). 4: 66–81.
- ^ Cuvier, Geoges (1812). "Résumé général et rétablissement des Squelettes des diverses espèces". Recherches sur les ossemens fossiles de quadrupèdes: où l'on rétablit les caractères de plusieurs espèces d'animaux que les révolutions du globe paroissent avoir détruites (in French). Vol. 3. Chez Deterville. Archived from the original on 2023-07-31.
- ^ Rudwick, Martin J. S. (1997). "Chapter 6: The Animals from the Gypsum Beds around Paris". Georges Cuvier, Fossil Bones, and Geological Catastrophes: New Translations and Interpretations of the Primary Texts. University of Chicago Press.