ANCYLOPODA, or ANCYLODACTYLA

This article appears in Volume V01, Page 953 of the Encyclopedia Britannica.

Encyclopedia Britannica - Main :: ANC-APO

ANCYLOPODA, or ANCYLODACTYLA , an apparently primitive

extinct

EXTINCT

subordinal group of Ungulata showing certain resemblances to the Perissodactyla, both as regards the cheek-teeth and the skeleton, but broadly distinguished by the feet being of an edentate type, carrying long curved and cleft terminal claws. From this peculiar structure of the feet it would seem that the

weight

WEIGHT

of the

body

BODY

was mainly carried on their outer sides, as in Edentates. The group is typified by Chalicotherium, of which the

original

ORIGINAL

species was discovered in' the Lower Pliocene strata of Eppelsheim, Hesse-

Darmstadt

DARMSTADT

, in 1825, and named on the evidence of the teeth, the limbs being subsequently described as Macrotherium. The skull is short, with a dental

formula

of i., c.4-, p. . m. -, but in fully adult animals most of the front teeth were shed. The molar teeth recall those of Palaeosyops (see TITANOTHLRIIDAE). Remains referred to Chalicotherium have been also obtained from the Lower Pliocene and Upper Miocene strata of

Greece

GREECE

Hungary

HUNGARY
HUNGARY (Hungarian Magyarorszdg)

, India, China and North America. A skull from Pikermi, near Mt. Pentelikon, Attica, shows the absence in the adult state of upper and lower incisors and upper canines, much the same condition being indicated in an Indian skull. There were three toes to each foot, and the femur lacked a third trochanter.
Macrotherium, which is typically from the Middle Miocene of Sansan, in Gers, France, may indicate a distinct genus. Limb-bones nearly resembling those of Macrotherium, but relatively stouter, have been described from the Pliocene beds of Attica and Samos as Ancylotherium. In America the names Morotherium and Moropus have been applied to similar bones, on the belief that they indicated edentates. Macrotherium magnum must have been an animal of about 9 ft. in length.
The

South

SOUTH
SOUTH, ROBERT (1634–1716)

American genus Homalodontotherium is often placed in the Ancylopoda, but reasons against this view are given in the article LITOPTERNA. Professor H. F. Osborn considers that the Ancylopoda are directly descended from the Condylarthra.
See also H. F. Osborn, " The Ancylopoda Chalicotherium and Artionyx,"Amer. Nat. (1893), p. 118, and "Artionyx, a New Genus of Ancylopoda,"

Bull

. Amer. Mus. vol. v. p. I (1893). [N.B.Artionyx was subsequently found to be an Artiodactyle.] (R. L.*)

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