Arsinoitherium

Arsinoitherium is an extinct genus of paenungulate mammals belonging to the extinct order Embrithopoda. It is related to elephants, sirenians, and hyraxes. Arsinoitheres were superficially rhinoceros-like herbivores that lived during the Late Eocene and the Early Oligocene of North Africa from 36 to 30 million years ago, in areas of tropical rainforest and at the margin of mangrove swamps. A species described in 2004, A. giganteum, lived in Ethiopia about 27 million years ago.

Arsinoitherium

Aram Dulyan ( User:Aramgutang ) · CC BY 2.5 · via Wikipedia/Commons. May be a photograph of a specimen, or an artist’s reconstruction — an interpretation of a skeleton, since colour and soft tissue are almost never preserved.

On record

Recorded, not inferred
Sits inside
ArsinoitheriidaePBDB
Diet
insectivorePBDB, for Theria
Life habit
scansorialPBDB, for Eutheria
Motility
actively mobilePBDB, for Osteichthyes
Environment
terrestrialPBDB, for Eutheria
Length
3 mWikidata

Time the record covers

At least 10 million years on record.

The record covers at least 37.71 Mya to 27.3 Mya. No occurrence read is dated outside 41.03 Mya to 23.04 Mya.

Eocene — about 4 of 14 occurrencesEoceneOligocene — about 10 of 14 occurrencesOligoceneMiocene — about 0 of 14 occurrences42–41 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences41–40 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences40–40 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences40–39 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences39–38 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences38–38 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences38–37 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences37–36 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences36–36 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences36–35 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences35–35 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences35–34 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences34–33 Mya — about 0.6 occurrences33–33 Mya — about 0.7 occurrences33–32 Mya — about 0.7 occurrences32–31 Mya — about 0.7 occurrences31–31 Mya — about 0.7 occurrences31–30 Mya — about 0.7 occurrences30–30 Mya — about 0.7 occurrences30–29 Mya — about 0.7 occurrences29–28 Mya — about 0.7 occurrences28–28 Mya — about 0.7 occurrences28–27 Mya — about 0.6 occurrences27–26 Mya — about 0.5 occurrences26–26 Mya — about 0.5 occurrences26–25 Mya — about 0.5 occurrences25–24 Mya — about 0.5 occurrences24–24 Mya — about 0.5 occurrences24–23 Mya — about 0.5 occurrences23–23 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences37.71 Mya27.3 Mya41.5 Mya22.5 Mya

14 occurrences of Arsinoitherium on record, most of them in the Oligocene. Bar height is expected occurrences, not a count: each fossil is spread across the span it is dated to, so a tall narrow bar means tight dating and a low wide one means loose.

When

14 occurrences

These are dates about fossils, not the animal: the record can only begin after it arose and end before it died out, so either end may reach further. Shares are expected occurrences: a fossil dated to a span is counted partly in each period it straddles. More on what this infers.

Found in

8 formations

Jebel Qatrani — 29.50°N, 30.50°EJebel Qatrani — 29.64°N, 30.58°EAshawq — 17.06°N, 54.42°EAshawq — 17.00°N, 54.00°EIdam Unit — 25.71°N, 18.18°EAydim — 16.68°N, 53.15°EShumaysi — 21.68°N, 39.75°EErageleit — 3.36°N, 35.80°EMalembo — 5.34°S, 12.18°EAshawaq — 17.00°N, 53.00°E

Loading coastlines…

The named rock units Arsinoitherium has been recovered from, largest first. Drawn where the rock is now, not where it formed. 2 occurrences have no formation on record, which is common for older literature.

Arsinoitherium and its relatives

Oligocene

Where Arsinoitherium and its relatives were recorded in the Oligocene.

Found in the same rock

229 taxa

The Paleobiology Database records 13 sites for Arsinoitherium, and this reads all of them. The number is how many of those sites it was catalogued from too. The 24 sharing the most are listed.

This is not a list of everything alive at the time. It is only what has come out of the same ground as this animal and been written down.

Entered from

11 references

Each of the 14 occurrences read was entered from one of these publications, ordered by how many each accounts for. This is not a search for papers mentioning the name. Entries link to doi.org where the Paleobiology Database holds an identifier, and to its own record where it does not. Relayed as the Paleobiology Database holds them, not checked against what they resolve to.

Media and terms

Media content2

Picture of Arsinoitherium

Credit
Aram Dulyan ( User:Aramgutang )
Licence
CC BY 2.5
Commercial use
the licence allows it

3D model

Source
Sketchfab
Credit
Emm
Licence
CC Attribution
Commercial use
cannot be read from the licence given — check the record

Smithsonian Open Access and MorphoSource were not reached for this taxon, so this list is what the others held rather than everything there is.

The description on this site

Licence
CC BY-SA 4.0

This is what the site found, which is not the same as what exists.

Keep going

What may have been alongside itArsinoitheriidae through timeFormations of the OligoceneThe world it lived on

Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0. Beadnell 1902