Coelodonta antiquitatis

The woolly rhinoceros is an extinct species of rhinoceros that inhabited northern Eurasia during the Pleistocene epoch. The woolly rhinoceros was large, comparable in size to the largest living rhinoceros species, the white rhinoceros, and covered with long, thick hair that allowed it to survive in the extremely cold, harsh mammoth steppe. It had a massive hump reaching from its shoulder and fed mainly by grazing on herbaceous plants that grew in the steppe. Mummified carcasses preserved in permafrost and many bone remains of woolly rhinoceroses have been found. Images of woolly rhinoceroses are found among cave paintings in Europe and Asia, and evidence has been found suggesting that the species was hunted by humans. Like other Pleistocene megafauna, the species became extinct as part of the end-Pleistocene extinction event. The range of the woolly rhinoceros contracted towards Siberia beginning around 17,000 years ago, with the youngest reliable records being around 14,000 years old in northeast Siberia, coinciding with the Bølling–Allerød warming, which likely disrupted its habitat, with environmental DNA records possibly extending the range of the species around 9,800 years ago. Its closest living relative is the Sumatran rhinoceros.

Coelodonta antiquitatis

Didier Descouens · CC BY-SA 4.0 · via Wikipedia/Commons. May be a photograph of a specimen, or an artist’s reconstruction — an interpretation of a skeleton, since colour and soft tissue are almost never preserved.

On record

Recorded, not inferred
Sits inside
CoelodontaPBDB
Diet
browserPBDB, for Rhinocerotidae
Life habit
ground dwellingPBDB, for Rhinocerotidae
Motility
actively mobilePBDB, for Osteichthyes
Environment
terrestrialPBDB, for Eutheria
Length
3.6 mWikidata
Mass
2000 kgWikidata

Time the record covers

At least 645 thousand years on record.

The record covers at least 774 ka to 129 ka. No occurrence read is dated outside 7.246 Mya to 0 Mya.

Miocene — about 0 of 27 occurrencesMiocenePliocene — about 1 of 27 occurrencesPliocenePleistocene — about 26 of 27 occurrencesPleistoceneHolocene — about 0 of 27 occurrences7.5–7.2 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences7.2–7.0 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences7.0–6.7 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences6.7–6.5 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences6.5–6.2 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences6.2–5.9 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences5.9–5.7 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences5.7–5.4 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences5.4–5.2 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences5.2–4.9 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences4.9–4.6 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences4.6–4.4 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences4.4–4.1 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences4.1–3.9 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences3.9–3.6 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences3.6–3.4 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences3.4–3.1 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences3.1–2.8 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences2.8–2.6 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences2.6–2.3 Mya — about 1 occurrence2.3–2.1 Mya — about 1 occurrence2.1–1.8 Mya — about 1 occurrence1.8–1.5 Mya — about 1 occurrence1.5–1.3 Mya — about 1 occurrence1.3–1.0 Mya — about 1 occurrence1.0–775 ka Mya — about 1 occurrence775 ka–516 ka Mya — about 2 occurrences516 ka–258 ka Mya — about 2 occurrences258 ka–0 Mya — about 11 occurrences774 ka – 129 ka7.7 Mya0 Mya

27 occurrences of Coelodonta antiquitatis on record, most of them in the Pleistocene. Bar height is expected occurrences, not a count: each fossil is spread across the span it is dated to, so a tall narrow bar means tight dating and a low wide one means loose.

When

27 occurrences

These are dates about fossils, not the animal: the record can only begin after it arose and end before it died out, so either end may reach further. Shares are expected occurrences: a fossil dated to a span is counted partly in each period it straddles. More on what this infers.

Found in

1 formation

Oberer Travertin I — 50.97°N, 11.35°E

Loading coastlines…

The named rock units Coelodonta antiquitatis has been recovered from, largest first. Drawn where the rock is now, not where it formed. 26 occurrences have no formation on record, which is common for older literature.

Coelodonta antiquitatis and its relatives

Pleistocene

Where Coelodonta antiquitatis and its relatives were recorded in the Pleistocene.

Found in the same rock

220 taxa

The Paleobiology Database records 27 sites for Coelodonta antiquitatis, and this reads all of them. The number is how many of those sites it was catalogued from too. The 24 sharing the most are listed.

This is not a list of everything alive at the time. It is only what has come out of the same ground as this animal and been written down.

Entered from

17 references

Each of the 27 occurrences read was entered from one of these publications, ordered by how many each accounts for. This is not a search for papers mentioning the name. 5 further references are not listed. Entries link to doi.org where the Paleobiology Database holds an identifier, and to its own record where it does not. Relayed as the Paleobiology Database holds them, not checked against what they resolve to.

Media and terms

Media content2

Picture of Coelodonta antiquitatis

Credit
Didier Descouens
Licence
CC BY-SA 4.0
Commercial use
the licence allows it

3D model

Source
Sketchfab
Licence
CC Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike
Commercial use
the licence does not allow it

Smithsonian Open Access and MorphoSource were not reached for this taxon, so this list is what the others held rather than everything there is.

The description on this site

Licence
CC BY-SA 4.0

This is what the site found, which is not the same as what exists.

Keep going

What may have been alongside itCoelodonta through timeFormations of the PleistoceneThe world it lived on

Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0. (Blumenbach 1799)