Skip to main content

Advertisement

SpringerLink
Log in

Discovery of Cainochoerus (Mammalia, Artiodactyla, Suidae, Cainochoerinae) from the basal upper Miocene Nakali Formation, Kenya

  • Research Paper
  • Published:
PalZ Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

Cainochoerus (Cainochoerinae) is a minute fossil suid (Mammalia, Artiodactyla, Suoidea) and its molar morphology recalls that of cercopithecoid primates. It is endemic to ca. 6.5–5 Ma of Africa. Here, we describe a new specimen of Cainochoerus discovered from the basal upper Miocene (ca. 10 Ma, Tortonian) Nakali Formation of central Kenya, East Africa. The specimen is right m3 lacking the hypoconulid. It has a width of ca. 6 mm, bunodont and relatively simple cusps, small pre-median and median accessory cusps, very weak cristids, and no paraconid. It is almost identical in morphology and size to m3 of Cainochoerus africanus, which is the only species of the genus, and is distinguished from m3 of other tiny suoids and cercopithecoid primates. The present finding is the oldest record of the genus, contributing to understanding the phylogeny and origination of the subfamily Cainochoerinae.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Log in via an institution

Price excludes VAT (USA)
Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Institutional subscriptions

Fig. 1
Fig. 2

Similar content being viewed by others

Data availability

The availability statement of the fossil specimen described here is provided in the “Repository” subsection of the “Systematic palaeontology” section. The specimen is formally stoed in National Museums of Kenya, Nairobi, Kenya.

References

  • Bishop, L.C. 2010. Suoidea. In Cenozoic mammals of Africa, ed. L. Werdelin and W.J. Sanders, 821–842. Berkeley: University of California Press.

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  • Ginsburg, L. 1974. Les Tayassuidés des phosphorites du Quercy. Palaeovertebrata 6: 55–85.

    Google Scholar 

  • Golpe-Posse, J.M. 1977. Barberahyus castellensis n. g., n. sp., Tayassuido del Vindoboniense terminal de Castell de Barberà (Cuenca del Vallès, España). Palaeontología i Evolució 12: 31–43.

    Google Scholar 

  • Gray, J.E. 1821. On the natural arrangement of vertebrose animals. London Medical Repository 15: 296–310.

    Google Scholar 

  • Haile-Selassie, Y. 2009. Suidae. In Ardipithecus kadabba. Late Miocene evidence from the Middle Awash, Ethiopia, ed. Y. Haile-Selassie and G. Wolde Gabriel, 331–371. Berkeley: University of California Press.

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  • Handa, N., M. Nakatsukasa, Y. Kunimatsu, T. Tsubamoto, and H. Nakaya. 2021. The Chalicotheriidae (Mammalia, Perissodactyla) from the upper Miocene Nakali Formation, Kenya. Historical Biology 33: 3522–3529.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Harris, J.M., and M.G. Leakey. 2003. Lothagam Suidae. In Lothagam: The dawn of humanity in Eastern Africa, ed. M.G. Leakey and J.M. Harris, 485–519. New York: Columbia University Press.

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  • Harris, J.M., and L.-P. Liu. 2007. Superfamily Suoidea. In The evolution of Artiodactyls, ed. D.R. Prothero and S.E. Foss, 130–150. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Hendey, Q.B. 1976. Fossil peccary from the Pliocene of South Africa. Science 192: 787–789.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Kunimatsu, Y., M. Nakatsukasa, Y. Sawada, T. Sakai, M. Hyodo, H. Hyodo, T. Itaya, H. Nakaya, H. Saegusa, A. Mazurier, M. Saneyoshi, H. Tsujikawa, A. Yamamoto, and E. Mbua. 2007. A new Late Miocene great ape from Kenya and its implications for the origins of African great apes and humans. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America 104: 19220–19225.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Kunimatsu, Y., M. Nakatsukasa, Y. Sawada, T. Sakai, M. Saneyoshi, H. Nakaya, A. Yamamoto, and E. Mbua. 2016. A second hominoid species in the early Late Miocene fauna of Nakali (Kenya). Anthropological Science 124: 75–83.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Linnaeus, C. 1758. Systema naturae per regna tria naturae, secundum classes, ordines, genera, species cum characteribus, differentiis, synonymis, locis. Tomus I. Editio decima, reformata. Stockholm (Holmiae): Laurentii Salvii.

  • Orliac, M.J., P.-O. Antoine, and S. Ducrocq. 2010. Phylogenetic relationships of the Suidae (Mammalia, Cetartiodactyla): New insights on the relationships within Suoidea. Zoologica Scripta 39: 315–330.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Orliac, M.J., P.-O. Antoine, and F. Duranthon. 2006. The Suoidea (Mammalia, Artiodactyla), exclusive of Listriodontinae, from the early Miocene of Béon 1 (Montréal-du-Gers, SW France, MN4). Geodiversitas 28: 685–718.

    Google Scholar 

  • Owen, R. 1848. Description of teeth and portions of jaw of two extinct anthracotherioid quadrupeds (Hyopotamus vectianus and Hyop. bovinus) discovered by the Marchioness of Hastings in the Eocene deposits of the N.W. coast of the Isle of Wight: With an attempt to develop Cuvier’s idea of the classification of Pachyderms by the number of their toes. The Quarterly Journal of the Geological Society of London 4: 103–141.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Pickford, M. 1986. A revision of the Miocene Suidae and Tayassuidae, (Artiodactyla, Mammalia) of Africa. Tertiary Research Special Paper 7: 1–83.

    Google Scholar 

  • Pickford, M. 1988. Un étrange suidé nain du Néogène supérieur de Langebaanweg (Afrique du Sud). Annales de Paléontologie (Vertebrata-Invertebrata) 74: 229–250.

    Google Scholar 

  • Pickford, M. 1995 (for 1993). Old World suoid systematics, phylogeny, biogeography and biostratigraphy. Paleontologia i Evolució 26–27: 237–269.

  • Pickford, M. 2006. Synopsis of the biochronology of African Neogene and Quaternary Suiformes. Transactions of the Royal Society of South Africa 61: 51–62.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Pickford, M. 2011. Small suoids from the Miocene of Europe and Asia. Estudios Geológicos 67: 541–578.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Sakai, T., M. Saneyoshi, Y. Sawada, M. Nakatsukasa, Y. Kunimatsu, and E. Mbua. 2013. Early continental rift basin stratigraphy, depositional facies and tectonics in volcaniclastic system: examples from the Miocene successions along the Japan Sea and in the East African Rift Valley (Kenya). In Mechanism of sedimentary basin formation—Multidisciplinary approach on active plate margin, ed. Y. Itoh, 83–108. Rijeka: InTech.

    Google Scholar 

  • Simpson, S.W. 2013. Before Australopithecus: The earliest hominins. In A companion to paleoanthropology, ed. D.R. Begun, 417–433. Chichester: Blackwell Publishing Ltd.

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  • Tanabe, Y., M. Onodera, M. Nakatsukasa, Y. Kunimatsu, and H. Nakaya. 2020. A new cane rat (Rodentia, Thryonomyidae) from the Upper Miocene Nakali Formation, northern Kenya. Journal of the Geological Society of Japan 126: 167–181.

    Google Scholar 

  • Tsubamoto, T., Y. Kunimatsu, T. Sakai, M. Saneyoshi, D. Shimizu, N. Morimoto, H. Nakaya, N. Handa, Y. Tanabe, F.K. Manthi, and M. Nakatsukasa. 2020. A new species of Nyanzachoerus (Mammalia, Artiodactyla, Suidae, Tetraconodontinae) from the upper Miocene Nakali Formation, Kenya. Paleontological Research 24: 41–63.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Tsubamoto, T., Y. Kunimatsu, T. Sakai, M. Saneyoshi, D. Shimizu, N. Morimoto, H. Nakaya, and M. Nakatsukasa. 2017. Listriodontine suid and tragulid artiodactyls (Mammalia) from the upper Miocene Nakali Formation, Kenya. Paleontological Research 21: 347–357.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Uno, K.T., T.E. Cerling, J.M. Harris, Y. Kunimatsu, M.G. Leakey, M. Nakatsukasa, and H. Nakaya. 2011. Late Miocene to Pliocene carbon isotope record of differential diet change among East African herbivores. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America 108: 6509–6514.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • van der Made, J. 1996. Albanohyus, a small Miocene pig. Acta Zoologica Cracoviensia 39: 293–303.

    Google Scholar 

  • van der Made, J. 2010. The pigs and “Old World peccaries” (Suidae and Palaeochoeridae, Suoidea, Artiodactyla) from the Miocene of Sandelzhausen (southern Germany): Phylogeny and an updated classification of the Hyotheriinae and Palaeochoeridae. Paläontologische Zeitschrift 84: 43–121.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • van der Made, J. 2020. The Suoidea from the Middle Miocene of Gračanica (Bugojno Basin, Bosnia and Herzegovina)—Evolution, taxonomy, and biostratigraphy. Palaeobiodiversity and Palaeoenvironments 100: 321–349.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • van der Made, J. 2022. An updated range chart for the Oligocene to recent west Eurasian Suoidea. Variation in species richness. In NOW 25th Anniversary Meeting. Sabadell (Barcelona), 16–18 November 2022. Abstract Book & Fieldtrip Guide (Paleontologia i Evolució, Memòria Especial 9), eds. I. Casanovas-Vilar and D.M. Alba, 34–36. Sabadell: Institut Català de Paleontologia Miquel Crusafont.

  • Werdelin, L. 2010. Chronology of Neogene mammal localities. In Cenozoic mammals of Africa, ed. L. Werdelin and W.J. Sanders, 27–43. Berkeley: University of California Press.

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

Download references

Acknowledgements

We are grateful to the National Commission for Science, Technology and Innovation (NACOSTI), the Government of Kenya for according research permission to us. We thank Fredrick Kyalo Manthi, Nelly Silau, Margaret Omoto, Mary Muungu, and Francis Ndiritu Muchemi (National Museums of Kenya, Nairobi, Kenya) for their help in examining the specimens in the museum. We are also grateful to Nairobi Research Station, Japan Society for the Promotion of Science (Nairobi, Kenya) for the help during our stay in Kenya.

Funding

This research was supported by JSPS KAKENHI Grant Numbers 25257408, 16H02757 and 23H02562 (to M. Nakatsukasa) and Bilateral Programs Joint Research Project (JSPS-NACOSTI).

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Graduate School of Science and Engineering, Ehime University, 2-5 Bunkyo-cho, Matsuyama, Ehime, 790-8577, Japan

    Takehisa Tsubamoto

  2. Faculty of Business Administration, Ryukoku University, 67 Tsukamoto-cho, Fukakusa, Fushimi-ku, Kyoto, 612-8577, Japan

    Yutaka Kunimatsu

  3. Graduate School of Science, Kyoto University, Kitashirakawa Oiwake-cho, Sakyo-Ku, Kyoto, 606-8502, Japan

    Masato Nakatsukasa

Authors
  1. Takehisa Tsubamoto
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  2. Yutaka Kunimatsu
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  3. Masato Nakatsukasa
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Contributions

TT organized this study and analyzed data. TT and YK examined the specimen. YK and MN conducted paleontological field research and collected the fossil specimen. TT, YK, and MN wrote the paper.

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Takehisa Tsubamoto.

Additional information

Handling Editor: Irina Ruf.

Rights and permissions

Springer Nature or its licensor (e.g. a society or other partner) holds exclusive rights to this article under a publishing agreement with the author(s) or other rightsholder(s); author self-archiving of the accepted manuscript version of this article is solely governed by the terms of such publishing agreement and applicable law.

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this article

Tsubamoto, T., Kunimatsu, Y. & Nakatsukasa, M. Discovery of Cainochoerus (Mammalia, Artiodactyla, Suidae, Cainochoerinae) from the basal upper Miocene Nakali Formation, Kenya. PalZ 97, 621–626 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12542-023-00656-8

Download citation

  • Received:

  • Accepted:

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12542-023-00656-8

Keywords

Search

Navigation