Helaletidae

The Helaletidae are an extinct family of tapiroid, closely related and likely ancestral to the true tapirs, which contain Protapirus and all descendants. In alternative classifications, Helaletidae is treated as a subfamily within the Tapiridae, the Helaletinae.

Helaletidae

Uncredited · CC0 · 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
TapiroideaPBDB
Diet
browserPBDB, for Tapiroidea
Life habit
ground dwellingPBDB, for Tapiroidea
Motility
actively mobilePBDB, for Osteichthyes
Environment
terrestrialPBDB, for Eutheria

Time the record covers

At least 13 million years on record.

The record covers at least 51.1 Mya to 37.71 Mya. No occurrence read is dated outside 56 Mya to 33.9 Mya.

Paleocene — about 0 of 15 occurrencesEocene — about 15 of 15 occurrencesEoceneOligocene — about 0 of 15 occurrences57–56 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences56–55 Mya — about 1.0 occurrences55–54 Mya — about 1.0 occurrences54–53 Mya — about 1.0 occurrences53–53 Mya — about 1.0 occurrences53–52 Mya — about 1.0 occurrences52–51 Mya — about 1.0 occurrences51–50 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences50–50 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences50–49 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences49–48 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences48–47 Mya — about 0.6 occurrences47–46 Mya — about 0.6 occurrences46–46 Mya — about 0.5 occurrences46–45 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences45–44 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences44–43 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences43–43 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences43–42 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences42–41 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences41–40 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences40–40 Mya — about 0.4 occurrences40–39 Mya — about 0.6 occurrences39–38 Mya — about 0.6 occurrences38–37 Mya — about 0.5 occurrences37–36 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences36–36 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences36–35 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences35–34 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences34–33 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences51.1 Mya37.71 Mya56.5 Mya33.4 Mya

15 occurrences of Helaletidae on record, most of them in the Eocene. 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

15 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

10 formations

Willwood — 44.50°N, 108.00°WWillwood — 44.00°N, 108.00°WWasatch — 41.80°N, 110.70°W"Brian Head" — 37.80°N, 111.50°WShara Murum — 42.04°N, 111.53°EChakpaktas — 48.00°N, 84.00°EKuldana — 33.78°N, 72.68°EChorgali — 33.43°N, 72.63°EIrdin Manha — 43.65°N, 111.98°EErgilin Dzo — 43.40°N, 109.10°ECambay Shale — 21.40°N, 73.08°E

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The named rock units Helaletidae has been recovered from, largest first. Drawn where the rock is now, not where it formed. 1 occurrence has no formation on record, which is common for older literature.

Helaletidae and its relatives

Eocene

Where Helaletidae and its relatives were recorded in the Eocene.

Found in the same rock

248 taxa

The Paleobiology Database records 15 sites for Helaletidae, 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 15 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 content1

Picture of Helaletidae

Credit
nobody named on the record
Licence
CC0
Commercial use
the licence allows it

No 3D scan of Helaletidae was found in MorphoSource and Sketchfab.

Smithsonian Open Access was 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 itTapiroidea through timeFormations of the EoceneThe world it lived on

Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0. (Osborn 1892)