Talpa tyrrhenica
Talpa tyrrhenica, also known as the Tyrrhenian mole, is an extinct species of mole belonging to the genus Talpa. It was endemic to the Mediterranean islands of Corsica and Sardinia during the Pleistocene epoch.

Cardioceras · CC0 · 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
- TalpaPBDB
- Diet
- insectivorePBDB, for Talpidae
- Life habit
- fossorialPBDB, for Talpa
- Motility
- actively mobilePBDB, for Osteichthyes
- Environment
- terrestrialPBDB, for Eutheria
Time the record covers
At most 5.4 million years on record.
Every occurrence read is dated to somewhere between 5.333 Mya and 11.7 ka, and nothing in the dating separates them, so that window is what the record shows rather than a span.
6 occurrences of Talpa tyrrhenica 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
6 occurrences- Pliocene17%
- Pleistocene83%
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.
Talpa tyrrhenica and its relatives
PleistoceneWhere Talpa tyrrhenica and its relatives were recorded in the Pleistocene.
Found in the same rock
49 taxa- Prolagus sardus5 sites
- Lacerta4 sites
- Nesiotites4 sites
- "Colubrines" indet.3 sites
- Anura3 sites
- Microtus (Tyrrhenicola) henseli3 sites
- Oryctolagus3 sites
- Speleomantes sp.3 sites
- Agama2 sites
- Caprinae2 sites
- Macaca2 sites
- Nesogoral <sp. 2>2 sites
- Nesogoral aff. melonii2 sites
- Osteichthyes2 sites
- Pannonictis2 sites
- Rallidae2 sites
- Rhagamys orthodon2 sites
- Rhagapodemus2 sites
- Sauria2 sites
- Serpentes2 sites
- Accipitridae1 site
- Alauda arvensis1 site
- Amphisbaenia1 site
- Anatidae1 site
The Paleobiology Database records 6 sites for Talpa tyrrhenica, 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
2 references- Plio-Pleistocene fossil vertebrates of Monte Tuttavista (Orosei, Eastern Sardinia, Italy), an overview5
- An overview of the fossil turtles from Sardinia (Italy)1
Each of the 6 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. 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 Talpa tyrrhenica
- Source
- Wikipedia/Commons
- Credit
- Cardioceras
- Licence
- CC0
- Commercial use
- the licence allows it
No 3D scan of Talpa tyrrhenica was found in MorphoSource and Sketchfab.
Smithsonian Open Access was 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 itTalpa through timeFormations of the PleistoceneThe world it lived on
Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0. Bate 1945