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The Prehistoric Horse Thread

Comments

  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 5,279 ✭✭✭Adam Khor


    It's called a "Probodiscipparion", and its described as being "large to giant sized" and having a similar nose structure to a tapir. A trunked horse? :eek:
    It is also said to have lived besides water, like a tapir. A water horse?? :eek::eek:

    http://www.physorg.com/news/2012-02-skull-hipparion-early-pleistocene-longdan.html

    skullofhippa.jpg

    1-skullofhippa.jpg


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 30,746 ✭✭✭✭Galvasean


    What an amazing creature! Any idea what they mean by 'large to giant' in terms of size?
    Also, I'm surprised that it's in the Hipparion genus. I would have imagined it would have been an entirely new genus.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 5,279 ✭✭✭Adam Khor


    Galvasean wrote: »
    What an amazing creature! Any idea what they mean by 'large to giant' in terms of size?
    Also, I'm surprised that it's in the Hipparion genus. I would have imagined it would have been an entirely new genus.

    Me too...

    I don´t know what large to giant means in this case... I believe the largest prehistoric horses known are on the higher end of modern day horse size range.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 30,746 ✭✭✭✭Galvasean


    Horses are a strange one. They've (as far as we know) never had a branch that evolved toward 'gigantism'. Practically every animal family does at some point.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 5,279 ✭✭✭Adam Khor


    Galvasean wrote: »
    Horses are a strange one. They've (as far as we know) never had a branch that evolved toward 'gigantism'. Practically every animal family does at some point.

    Eqqus giganteus and Eqqus capensis were quite big, actually... up to 2 m tall and about as heavy as some of the largest modern day horse breeds. Plus there's tons of equine fossils that haven´t been properly described/announced and may be as large or larger than these two.


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  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 5,279 ✭✭✭Adam Khor


    These ancient horses apparently had trunks.

    The study separates three distinct genera of prehistoric, browsing horses that apparently developed tapir-like trunks independently from each other.

    https://riviste.unimi.it/index.php/RIPS/article/view/10202

    proboscidipparion_pater_by_sinammonite-danqihq.jpg


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 5,279 ✭✭✭Adam Khor


    Incredible!


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 1,468 ✭✭✭Heraldoffreeent


    He's a bit thin..........


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  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 78,576 ✭✭✭✭Victor


    Have there been (m)any pre-1492 finds of horses in the Americas?


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 5,279 ✭✭✭Adam Khor


    Yes of course. Horses were abundant and diverse in the Americas until about 12.000-10.000 years ago, when they went extinct along with other megaherbivores (mammoths, camels, giant bison etc).


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 2,480 ✭✭✭Kamili


    I wonder if they will find the head.


  • Moderators, Science, Health & Environment Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators Posts: 60,217 Mod ✭✭✭✭Wibbs


    From what I read of the find it was uncovered during some garden landscaping of some nature and sadly apparently earlier work had taken the head and they found bits of skull and a few teeth in disturbed soil nearby.

    Rejoice in the awareness of feeling stupid, for that’s how you end up learning new things. If you’re not aware you’re stupid, you probably are.



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 5,279 ✭✭✭Adam Khor


    That is sad. Countless fossils must have been lost that way without anyone even noticing. :(


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 5,279 ✭✭✭Adam Khor


    Horse family tree simpler than previously believed, suggests DNA study.

    https://www.horsetalk.co.nz/2019/09/20/ancient-dna-simpler-family-tree-horses/

    Samples-study.jpg?w=800&ssl=1

    hippidion.jpg?w=800&ssl=1


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