The Entelodonts

When my friend Dr. Scott Foss told me that the BBC programme Walking with Prehistoric Beasts would feature an entelodont I was rather surprised to hear that they were interested in this little-known group of mammals. Entelodonts are such large and brutish creatures that they deserve a look.

Entelodonts are members of the Order Artiodactyla, which are the even-toed ungulates (hoofed mammals). Their name comes from the Greek words artios ("even" ) and dactylos ("digit"). Modern artiodactyls include cows, deer, giraffes and okapi, camels, pigs, hippopotamuses, gazelles, antelopes, bison, buffalo and sheep. They differ from the Order Perissodactyla, which have odd numbers of toes, such as horses, tapirs and rhinos.

The artiodactyls first appeared during the Early Eocene Epoch (55 to 36 million years ago). With the exception of the pigs and hippopotamuses, all artiodactyls are ruminants; the pigs and hippos tend to be omnivorous, meaning that they eat both plants and animals.

The entelodonts belong to the Family Entelodontidae. Although they are often referred to as "giant pigs," they are actually distant relatives of the Family Suidae, the "true pigs;" they do share a common ancestor. The entelodonts first appeared in the Late Eocene Epoch in Asia, spread to Europe and North America during the Oligocene Epoch (36 to 22.5 million years ago and survived to the Late Miocene Epoch (22.5 to 5 million years ago).

Their incisor teeth were large and heavy and show wearing, suggesting that the entelodonts fed on tubers (root vegetables), vines, branches, fruits and nuts. Their molars were large and simple, designed for crushing. Entelodont toothmarks have been found on the fossilized bones of rhinos and brontotheres. This would indicate that entelodonts probably scavenged meat the way that modern wild pigs do, and they used their powerful jaws to crack open bones and eat the nutritious bone marrow inside.

One of the most noticeable characteristics of the entelodonts are their large, robust skulls and the tuberosities (knobs or bumps) on their skulls. These knobs appear to be for the attachment of powerful jaw muscles, which would have aided in crushing bones and grinding food with their molars.

Entelodonts appear to have fought often with each other, probably for food, mates and territories. Their skulls show broken cheekbones, smashed eye-sockets and one-inch (2 cm)-deep bite marks across their muzzles, all inflicted by other entelodonts.

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