Hoplophoneus
Name:
Hoplophoneus
(Armed murderer).
Phonetic: Hop-loe-foe-ne-us.
Named By: Edward Drinker Cope - 1874.
Synonyms: Dinotomius, Drepanodon,
Eusmilus dakotensis, Hoplophoneus insolens, Hoplophoneus
latidens, Hoplophoneus marshi, Hoplophoneus molossus,
Hoplophoneus oharrai, Hoplophoneus oreodontis, Hoplophoneus
robustus, Machairodus occidentalis, Machaerodus oreodontis,
Nanosmilus kurteni.
Classification: Chordata, Mammalia, Carnivore,
Nimravidae, Hoplophoninae.
Species: H. primaevus (type), H.
cerebralis, H.
dakotensis, H. occidentalis, H. oharrai, H. sicarius, H. strigidens.
Diet: Carnivore.
Size: Around 1.3 meters long and estimated up
to 160 kilograms.
Known locations: Canada and the USA.
Time period: Bartonian of the Eocene through to the
early Rupelian of the Oligocene.
Fossil representation: Multiple specimens.
Originally
known as Drepanodon, fossils of this mammal were
renamed Hoplophoneus
by Edward Drinker Cope in 1874. Although resembling a big cat,
Hoplophoneus was actually one of the nimravids,
more popularly known
as the ‘false sabre-toothed cats’. Nimravids were descended from
an early off shoot of the carnivora and were actively hunting long
before the emergence of the true cats of the Felidae.
Nimravids
seem to have anticipated the later sabre-toothed cats like Machairodus
and Smilodon
since many also have enlarged sabre-like canine teeth in
the upper jaw. Like with many of its relations, Hoplophoneus
also
had two flanges of bone that grew downwards from the lower jaw. These
gave extra support and protection to the canines because when the mouth
was closed the tips of the upper canines extended well beyond the lower
jaw.
The
relatively short legs of Hoplophoneus indicate that
it could accelerate
to top running speed very quickly, but would also have its top speed
limited because its legs could not cover as much ground with every
stride. For this reason Hoplophoneus is seen as
an ambush hunter that
would lie within the cover of the undergrowth before exploding out and
chasing down prey animals before they had time to react and run away.
Likely prey could have included primitive horses such as Mesohippus
that were not only much smaller than modern forms, but were also
browsers of vegetation (horses would not start switching to become
grazers of grass until later). This would place Hoplophoneus
in a
prime vantage point for striking at prey since ultimately prey would
have to come to the areas where it was hiding in order to feed.
Further reading
- The Mammalian Fauna of the White River Oligocene: Part I. Insectivora
and Carnivora. - Transactions of the American Philosophical Society
28(1):1-153 - W. B. Scott & G. L. Jepsen - 1936.
- Phylogeny of early Tertiary Carnivora, with a description of a new
species of Protictis from the middle Eocene of northwestern Wyoming. -
American Museum Novitates 2725:1-64. - J. H. Flynn & H. Galiano
- 1982.
- Discovery, in the Oligocene of South Dakota, of Eusmilus, a Genus of
Sabre-toothed Cats New to North America. - The American Naturalist
29(348):1091-1093. - J. B. Hatcher - 1985.
- A new miniature saber-toothed nimravid from the Oligocene of
Nebraska. - Annales Zoologici Fennici 28:341-348. - L. D. Martin -
1992.
- Taxonomic and systematic revisions to the North American Nimravidae
(Mammalia, Carnivora). - PeerJ - P. Z. Barrett - 2016.
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