Eomys

Eomys is an extinct genus of eomyid rodent from the late Oligocene of France, Germany, Spain, and possibly Turkey. The species Eomys quercyi is the earliest known gliding rodent.

Eomys

Nobu Tamura · CC BY 3.0 · 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
EomyidaePBDB
Diet
herbivorePBDB, for Rodentia
Life habit
volantPBDB
Motility
actively mobilePBDB, for Osteichthyes
Environment
terrestrialPBDB, for Eutheria

Time the record covers

At least 11 million years on record.

The record covers at least 27.3 Mya to 15.98 Mya. No occurrence read is dated outside 33.9 Mya to 13.82 Mya.

Eocene — about 0 of 75 occurrencesOligocene — about 74 of 75 occurrencesOligoceneMiocene — about 1 of 75 occurrencesMiocene34–34 Mya — about 1 occurrence34–33 Mya — about 4 occurrences33–32 Mya — about 4 occurrences32–32 Mya — about 4 occurrences32–31 Mya — about 4 occurrences31–30 Mya — about 4 occurrences30–29 Mya — about 4 occurrences29–29 Mya — about 4 occurrences29–28 Mya — about 4 occurrences28–27 Mya — about 4 occurrences27–27 Mya — about 5 occurrences27–26 Mya — about 6 occurrences26–25 Mya — about 6 occurrences25–25 Mya — about 6 occurrences25–24 Mya — about 6 occurrences24–23 Mya — about 6 occurrences23–22 Mya — about 0.9 occurrences16–15 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences15–15 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences15–14 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences14–13 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences27.3 Mya15.98 Mya34.4 Mya13.3 Mya

75 occurrences of Eomys on record, most of them in the Oligocene. 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

75 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

7 formations

Hsanda Gol — 45.41°N, 101.26°EHsanda Gol — 45.27°N, 101.76°EHsanda Gol — 45.31°N, 101.63°ELignite-Sandstone — 41.00°N, 26.82°ELignite-Sandstone — 40.92°N, 26.81°ELignite-Sandstone — 38.15°N, 26.90°ECalcaires de Vacheres — 43.87°N, 5.52°EWulanbulage — 40.33°N, 107.00°EWulanbulage — 39.65°N, 106.68°EEnspel — 50.61°N, 7.89°EBorgloon — 50.85°N, 4.82°ELower Detrital — 40.56°N, 2.65°W

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The named rock units Eomys has been recovered from, largest first. Drawn where the rock is now, not where it formed. 51 occurrences have no formation on record, which is common for older literature.

Eomys and its relatives

Oligocene

Where Eomys and its relatives were recorded in the Oligocene.

Found in the same rock

503 taxa

The Paleobiology Database records 60 sites for Eomys, 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

25 references

Each of the 75 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. 13 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 content1

Picture of Eomys

Credit
Nobu Tamura
Licence
CC BY 3.0
Commercial use
the licence allows it

No 3D scan was found. Smithsonian Open Access, MorphoSource and Sketchfab were all searched.

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 itEomyidae through timeFormations of the OligoceneThe world it lived on

Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0. Schlosser 1884