''Metailurus'' is a

genus Genus ( plural genera ) is a taxonomic rank used in the biological classification of living and fossil organisms as well as viruses. In the hierarchy of biological classification, genus comes above species and below family. In binomial nom ...

saber-toothed cat Machairodontinae is an extinct subfamily of carnivoran mammals of the family Felidae (true cats). They were found in Asia, Africa, North America, South America, and Europe from the Miocene to the Pleistocene, living from about 16 million ...

in the family

Felidae Felidae () is the family of mammals in the order Carnivora colloquially referred to as cats, and constitutes a clade. A member of this family is also called a felid (). The term "cat" refers both to felids in general and specifically to the dom ...

, and belonging to the tribe

Metailurini Metailurini is an extinct taxonomic tribe of large saber-toothed cats that lived in Africa, Asia, Europe, and North America from the Miocene to the Pleistocene. The best known Metalurini genera are ''Dinofelis'' and '' Metailurus''. Metailurini ...

, which occurred in

North America North America is a continent in the Northern Hemisphere and almost entirely within the Western Hemisphere. It is bordered to the north by the Arctic Ocean, to the east by the Atlantic Ocean, to the southeast by South America and th ...

Eurasia Eurasia (, ) is the largest continental area on Earth, comprising all of Europe and Asia. Primarily in the Northern and Eastern Hemispheres, it spans from the British Isles and the Iberian Peninsula in the west to the Japanese archipelag ...

and

Africa Africa is the world's second-largest and second-most populous continent, after Asia in both cases. At about 30.3 million km2 (11.7 million square miles) including adjacent islands, it covers 6% of Earth's total surface area ...

from the

Miocene The Miocene ( ) is the first geological epoch of the Neogene Period and extends from about (Ma). The Miocene was named by Scottish geologist Charles Lyell; the name comes from the Greek words (', "less") and (', "new") and means "less recen ...

to the

Middle Pleistocene The Chibanian, widely known by its previous designation of Middle Pleistocene, is an age in the international geologic timescale or a stage in chronostratigraphy, being a division of the Pleistocene Epoch within the ongoing Quaternary Period. Th ...

. This genus was formally described by O. Zdansky in 1924. ''Metailurus minor'' has been reassigned to the felid genus ''

Yoshi Yoshi is a fictional dinosaur who appears in video games published by Nintendo. Yoshi debuted in ''Super Mario World'' (1990) on the Super Nintendo Entertainment System as Mario and Luigi's sidekick. Yoshi is the title character of the ''Yoshi' ...

''.

Description

The canines of ''Metailurus'' are longer than those of even the

clouded leopard The clouded leopard (''Neofelis nebulosa''), also called the mainland clouded leopard, is a wild cat inhabiting dense forests from the foothills of the Himalayas through mainland Southeast Asia into South China. In the early 19th century, a ...

, but significantly shorter than true saber teeth, and more conical than bladed. A partial skeleton found in the Turolian site of Kerassia 1 consists of the jawbone, the anterior and posterior limb bone elements, and some sternal bones and some vertebrae. This is the most complete known of the species. Its dental material is comparative to those specimens from Pikerm, Chomateri, and China. The presence of elongated posterior limbs indicate that it had developed jumping skills.Roussiakis, S. J., Theodorou, G. E., & Iliopoulos, G. (2006). An almost complete skeleton of ''Metailurus parvulus'' (Carnivora, Felidae) from the late Miocene of Kerassia (Northern Euboea, Greece). Geobios, 39(4), 563-584. doi:10.1016/j.geobios.2005.04.002

References

External links

* Metailurini Miocene felids Pliocene carnivorans Pliocene extinctions Prehistoric carnivoran genera Cenozoic mammals of North America Cenozoic mammals of Africa Neogene mammals of Asia Cenozoic mammals of Europe Fossil taxa described in 1924 {{feline-stub