''Urotherium'' 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 ...

genus Genus (; : genera ) is a taxonomic rank above species and below family (taxonomy), family as used in the biological classification of extant taxon, living and fossil organisms as well as Virus classification#ICTV classification, viruses. In bino ...

Glyptodont Glyptodonts are an extinct clade of large, heavily armoured armadillos, reaching up to in height, and maximum body masses of around 2 tonnes. They had short, deep skulls, a fused vertebral column, and a large bony carapace made up of hundreds o ...

. It lived from the Late

Miocene The Miocene ( ) is the first epoch (geology), 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 mea ...

to the Late

Pliocene The Pliocene ( ; also Pleiocene) is the epoch (geology), epoch in the geologic time scale that extends from 5.33 to 2.58South America South America is a continent entirely in the Western Hemisphere and mostly in the Southern Hemisphere, with a considerably smaller portion in the Northern Hemisphere. It can also be described as the southern Subregion#Americas, subregion o ...

Description

This animal, like all glyptodonts, had a strong dorsal armor composed of numerous osteoderms fused together. The genus was characterized by an almost cylindrical caudal tube, obtuse and covered of small and raised osteoderms separated by wide and deep furrows. A pair of lateral osteoderms was preceded by other poorly differentiated osteoderms. The osteoderms of the carapace resembled those of the genus '' Trachycalyptus'', remarkably wrinkled and strongly punctuated, with a barely distinct central figure, less dotted than the peripheral area. Compared to ''Trachycalyptus'', the osteoderms of ''Urotherium'' were thicker and more rounded. In the species ''Urotherium simile'', the osteoderms had lost their sutures and resembled those of '' Glyptodon''.

Classification

The genus ''Urotherium'' was first described in 1926 by Castellanos, based on fossil remains found in

Argentina Argentina, officially the Argentine Republic, is a country in the southern half of South America. It covers an area of , making it the List of South American countries by area, second-largest country in South America after Brazil, the fourt ...

found in Late Miocene-Early Pliocene terrains. The

type species In International_Code_of_Zoological_Nomenclature, zoological nomenclature, a type species (''species typica'') is the species name with which the name of a genus or subgenus is considered to be permanently taxonomically associated, i.e., the spe ...

is ''Urotherium simplex'' ; another species, ''U. simile'', was described in 1948 by Castellanos, and ''U. simile'' was later ascribed to the genus, having originally been described by

Florentino Ameghino Florentino Ameghino (born Giovanni Battista Fiorino Giuseppe Ameghino; September 19, 1853 – August 6, 1911) was an Argentine naturalist, paleontologist, anthropologist and zoologist, whose fossil discoveries on the Argentine Pampas, especial ...

as belonging to another genus of glyptodont. The status of ''U. antiquus'', another species, is disputed between the genera ''

Neuryurus ''Neuryurus'' is an extinct genus of glyptodont. It lived from the Late Pliocene to the Early Holocene, and its fossilized remains were discovered in South America. Description This genus, like all glyptodonts, had a heavy armor formed by oste ...

'' and '' Plohophorus''. ''Urotherium'' was a genus of glyptodont of uncertain affinities, variously placed within the tribes Neuryurini, Hoplophorini and Lomaphorini. It may have been the sister taxon of the genus ''Neuryurus''.

Bibliography

*Castellanos A. 1926. Sobre un nuevo gliptodóntido chapadmalense. Urotherium simplex n. gen. n. sp. y las formas afines. An Mus Nac Hist Nat Buenos Aires 60: 263-278. *Castellanos A. 1948. La presencia del género "Urotherium" en el "Araucanense" del Valle del Yocavil (Santa María), provincias de Catamarca y Tucumán. Pub Inst Fisiogr Geol 35: 1-16. *Zurita, A.E., Taglioretti, M., De los Reyes, Martin., Cuadrelli, F., and Poire, D. 2016. Regarding the real diversity of Glyptodontidae (Mammalia, Xenarthra) in the late Pliocene (Chapadmalalan Age/Stage) of Argentina. Anais da Academia Brasileira de Ciências, 88:809-821. {{Taxonbar, from=Q60977627 Prehistoric cingulates Prehistoric placental genera Miocene xenarthrans Miocene genus first appearances Miocene mammals of South America Pliocene mammals of South America Pliocene xenarthrans Pliocene genus extinctions Miocene Argentina Pliocene Argentina Fossils of Argentina Neogene Uruguay Fossils of Uruguay Fossil taxa described in 1926