The Cretan owl (''
Athene
Athena or Athene, often given the epithet Pallas, is an ancient Greek goddess associated with wisdom, warfare, and handicraft who was later syncretized with the Roman goddess Minerva. Athena was regarded as the patron and protectress o ...
cretensis'') is an
extinct
Extinction is the termination of an organism by the death of its Endling, last member. A taxon may become Functional extinction, functionally extinct before the death of its last member if it loses the capacity to Reproduction, reproduce and ...
species
A species () is often defined as the largest group of organisms in which any two individuals of the appropriate sexes or mating types can produce fertile offspring, typically by sexual reproduction. It is the basic unit of Taxonomy (biology), ...
of
owl
Owls are birds from the order Strigiformes (), which includes over 200 species of mostly solitary and nocturnal birds of prey typified by an upright stance, a large, broad head, binocular vision, binaural hearing, sharp talons, and feathers a ...
from the
Pleistocene
The Pleistocene ( ; referred to colloquially as the ''ice age, Ice Age'') is the geological epoch (geology), epoch that lasted from to 11,700 years ago, spanning the Earth's most recent period of repeated glaciations. Before a change was fin ...
of the island of
Crete
Crete ( ; , Modern Greek, Modern: , Ancient Greek, Ancient: ) is the largest and most populous of the Greek islands, the List of islands by area, 88th largest island in the world and the List of islands in the Mediterranean#By area, fifth la ...
, in the eastern
Mediterranean
The Mediterranean Sea ( ) is a sea connected to the Atlantic Ocean, surrounded by the Mediterranean basin and almost completely enclosed by land: on the east by the Levant in West Asia, on the north by Anatolia in West Asia and Southern ...
. It was first named by P.D.M. Weesie in a paper in 1982. In life, it would have been at least 60 cm tall, considerably larger than the 22 cm long
little owl
The little owl (''Athene noctua''), also known as the owl of Athena or owl of Minerva, is a bird that inhabits much of the temperate and warmer parts of Europe, the Palearctic east to Korea, and North Africa. It was introduced into Britain at t ...
(''Athene noctua'') and appears to have been terrestrially adapted, with relatively short wings and long legs (though they were proportionally shorter than those of the
burrowing owl
The burrowing owl (''Athene cunicularia''), also called the shoco, is a small, long-legged, primarily terrestrial—though not flightless—species of owl native to the open landscapes of North and South America. They are typically found in gra ...
). Its primary prey was likely the endemic
mouse
A mouse (: mice) is a small rodent. Characteristically, mice are known to have a pointed snout, small rounded ears, a body-length scaly tail, and a high breeding rate. The best known mouse species is the common house mouse (''Mus musculus'' ...
species ''
Mus minotaurus'', as evidenced by the numerous owl pellets containing it recovered from the caves from which the bones of ''A. cretensis'' were found.
[M. Pavia, C. Mourer-ChauvirĂ]
An overview of the Genus ''Athene'' in the Pleistocene of the Mediterranean Islands, with the Description of ''Athene trinacriae'' n.sp. (Aves: Strigidae)
Z. Zhou, F. Zhang (Eds.), Proceedings of the 5th Symposium of the Society of Avian Paleontology and Evolution, Beijing Science Press (2002), pp. 13-27
References
Athene (bird)
Quaternary birds of Europe
Prehistoric Crete
Fossil taxa described in 1982
{{Strigiformes-stub