Protanancus
Protanancus is an extinct genus of amebelodontid proboscidean native to Africa, Asia, and North America during the Miocene epoch. The generic name is derived from the unrelated Anancus, and the Greek prōtos "first".

Jdp.edu · CC BY-SA 4.0 · 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
- AmebelodontinaePBDB
- Diet
- browserPBDB, for Gomphotheriidae
- Life habit
- ground dwellingPBDB, for Gomphotheriidae
- Motility
- actively mobilePBDB, for Osteichthyes
- Environment
- terrestrialPBDB, for Eutheria
Time the record covers
At least 4.3 million years on record.
The record covers at least 15.98 Mya to 11.63 Mya. No occurrence read is dated outside 20.45 Mya to 5.333 Mya.
9 occurrences of Protanancus on record, most of them in the Miocene. 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
9 occurrences- Miocene100%
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
4 formations
- Maboko Formation3
- Chinji Formation · Siwalik Group2
- Tiim Formation1
- Vihowa Formation1
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The named rock units Protanancus 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.
Protanancus and its relatives
MioceneWhere Protanancus and its relatives were recorded in the Miocene.
Found in the same rock
159 taxa- Bovidae6 sites
- Crocodylus4 sites
- Rhinocerotidae4 sites
- Aceratherium3 sites
- Brachypotherium3 sites
- Creodonta3 sites
- Deinotherium3 sites
- Dorcatherium pigotti3 sites
- Listriodon akatikubas3 sites
- Megalochoerus khinzikebirus3 sites
- Prodeinotherium hobleyi3 sites
- Trionyx3 sites
- Aprotodon fatehjangense2 sites
- Artiodactyla2 sites
- Chilotheridium pattersoni2 sites
- Choerlophodon kisumuensis2 sites
- Choerolophodon corrugatus2 sites
- Climacoceras africanus2 sites
- Crocodylia2 sites
- Dicerorhinus2 sites
- Dorcatherium2 sites
- Dorcatherium chappuisi2 sites
- Dorcatherium majus2 sites
- Equatorius africanus2 sites
The Paleobiology Database records 9 sites for Protanancus, 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
8 references- New fossil remains of proboscideans from the Siwalik group of Pakistan2
- First occurrence of Duboisia (Bovidae, Artiodactyla, Mammalia) from Thailand1
- Will Downs and the Zinda Pir Dome1
- Nouvelles decouvertes de vertebres miocenes dans le synclina de Dera Bugti (Balouchistan, Pakistan)1
- Evidence for an arid climate in western Uganda during the middle Miocene1
- Systematics and biogeography of middle Miocene rodents from the Muruyur Beds, Baringo District, Kenya1
- New Higher Primate Fossils from the Middle Miocene Deposits at Majiwa and Kaloma, Western Kenya1
- The Miocene fossil beds of Maboko Island, Kenya: Geology, age, taphonomy, and palaeontology1
Each of the 9 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 Protanancus
- Source
- Wikipedia/Commons
- Credit
- Jdp.edu
- Licence
- CC BY-SA 4.0
- Commercial use
- the licence allows it
No 3D scan of Protanancus was found in Smithsonian Open Access and Sketchfab.
MorphoSource was not reached for this taxon, so this list is what the others held rather than everything there is.
The description on this site
- Source
- Wikipedia, “Protanancus”
- 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 itAmebelodontinae through timeFormations of the MioceneThe world it lived on
Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0. Arambourg 1945