Animalia > Chordata > Mammalia > Proboscidea > Elephantidae > Mammuthus > Elephas creticus

Elephas creticus

Synonyms: Mammuthus creticus

Wikipedia Abstract

Mammuthus creticus, or Cretan dwarf mammoth, is an extinct species of dwarf mammoth. With a shoulder height of about 1 m and a weight of about 180 kg, it was the smallest mammoth that ever existed. After DNA research published in 2006, it was proposed to rename Palaeoloxodon creticus into Mammuthus creticus (Bate, 1907). Others proposed (in 2002) to rename all the described specimens of larger size under the new subspecies name Elephas antiquus creutzburgi (Kuss, 1965). In a study of 2007, it was argued for the groundlessness of the theory by Poulakakis et al. in 2006, showing the weak points of that DNA research. However, morphological data is at least equivocal, and may also support placement in Mammuthus.
View Wikipedia Record: Elephas creticus

External References

Citations

Abstract provided by DBpedia licensed under a Creative Commons License
Species taxanomy provided by GBIF Secretariat (2022). GBIF Backbone Taxonomy. Checklist dataset https://doi.org/10.15468/39omei accessed via GBIF.org on 2023-06-13; License: CC BY 4.0