Hypercoryphodon

Hypercoryphodon is an extinct genus of rhinoceros-sized pantodont native to Late Eocene Mongolia, and was very similar to its ancestor, Coryphodon. Described from a skull, Hypercoryphodon is a quadrupedal hippopotamus-like herbivore that may have been able to adapt its feeding to suit different situations. It is thought to have possibly lived in wetland to forest ecosystems that it might have shared with other herbivores such as dinoceratans like Gobiatherium. The low-crowned teeth of Hypercoryphodon were adapted for feeding on soft aquatic vegetation.

Hypercoryphodon

Henry Fairfield Osborn (1857-1935); Walter Granger (1872-1941) · Public Domain · 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
CoryphodontidaePBDB
Diet
herbivorePBDB, for Pantodonta
Life habit
ground dwellingPBDB, for Pantodonta
Motility
actively mobilePBDB, for Osteichthyes
Environment
terrestrialPBDB, for Pantodonta

Time the record covers

At most 3.9 million years on record.

Every occurrence read is dated to somewhere between 37.71 Mya and 33.9 Mya, and nothing in the dating separates them, so that window is what the record shows rather than a span.

Eocene — about 2 of 2 occurrencesEoceneOligocene — about 0 of 2 occurrences38–38 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences38–37 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences37–37 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences37–37 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences37–37 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences37–37 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences37–37 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences37–36 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences36–36 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences36–36 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences36–36 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences36–36 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences36–36 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences36–35 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences35–35 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences35–35 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences35–35 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences35–35 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences35–35 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences35–35 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences35–34 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences34–34 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences34–34 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences34–34 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences38.21 Mya33.4 Mya

2 occurrences of Hypercoryphodon 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

2 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

1 formation

Ergilin Dzo — 43.73°N, 111.25°E

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The named rock units Hypercoryphodon 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.

Hypercoryphodon and its relatives

Eocene

Where Hypercoryphodon and its relatives were recorded in the Eocene.

Found in the same rock

26 taxa

The Paleobiology Database records 2 sites for Hypercoryphodon, 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

2 references

Each of the 2 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. Each entry links to the Paleobiology Database's own record for the work.

Media and terms

Media content1

Picture of Hypercoryphodon

Credit
Henry Fairfield Osborn (1857-1935); Walter Granger (1872-1941)
Licence
Public Domain
Commercial use
the licence allows it

No 3D scan of Hypercoryphodon 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 itCoryphodontidae through timeFormations of the EoceneThe world it lived on

Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0. Osborn and Granger 1932