Teilhardina
Encyclopedia
Teilhardina was an early marmoset
Marmoset
Marmosets are the 22 New World monkey species of the genera Callithrix, Cebuella, Callibella, and Mico. All four genera are part of the biological family Callitrichidae. The term marmoset is also used in reference to the Goeldi's Monkey, Callimico goeldii, which is closely related.Most marmosets...

-like primate
Primate
A primate is a mammal of the order Primates , which contains prosimians and simians. Primates arose from ancestors that lived in the trees of tropical forests; many primate characteristics represent adaptations to life in this challenging three-dimensional environment...

 that lived in Europe
Europe
Europe is, by convention, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally 'divided' from Asia to its east by the watershed divides of the Ural and Caucasus Mountains, the Ural River, the Caspian and Black Seas, and the waterways connecting...

, North America
North America
North America is a continent wholly within the Northern Hemisphere and almost wholly within the Western Hemisphere. It is also considered a northern subcontinent of the Americas...

 and Asia
Asia
Asia is the world's largest and most populous continent, located primarily in the eastern and northern hemispheres. It covers 8.7% of the Earth's total surface area and with approximately 3.879 billion people, it hosts 60% of the world's current human population...

 during in the Early Eocene
Eocene
The Eocene Epoch, lasting from about 56 to 34 million years ago , is a major division of the geologic timescale and the second epoch of the Paleogene Period in the Cenozoic Era. The Eocene spans the time from the end of the Palaeocene Epoch to the beginning of the Oligocene Epoch. The start of the...

 epoch, about 56-47 million years ago. The paleontologist George Gaylord Simpson
George Gaylord Simpson
George Gaylord Simpson was an American paleontologist. Simpson was perhaps the most influential paleontologist of the twentieth century, and a major participant in the modern evolutionary synthesis, contributing Tempo and mode in evolution , The meaning of evolution and The major features of...

 is credited with naming it after Jesuit paleontologist and philosopher Teilhard de Chardin. It is known from quite a few species:
  • Teilhardina crassidens
  • Teilhardina belgica
  • Teilhardina americana
  • Teilhardina brandti
  • Teilhardina demissa
  • Teilhardina tenuicula
  • Teilhardina asiatica
  • Teilhardina magnoliana
    Teilhardina magnoliana
    Teilhardina magnoliana is the earliest known North American primate known from Mississippi. It crossed the land bridge from Siberia, possibly more than 55.8 million years ago, although the age of the fossil is a matter of disagreement. The animal weighed approximately one ounce. -External links:* ....



The placement of this genus is uncertain and it is likely to be polyphyletic. Two species (T. belgica and T. asiatica) appear to be haplorrhine, but equally ancestral to both modern tarsier
Tarsier
Tarsiers are haplorrhine primates of the genus Tarsius, a genus in the family Tarsiidae, which is itself the lone extant family within the infraorder Tarsiiformes...

s and simian
Simian
The simians are the "higher primates" familiar to most people: the Old World monkeys and apes, including humans, , and the New World monkeys or platyrrhines. Simians tend to be larger than the "lower primates" or prosimians.- Classification and evolution :The simians are split into three groups...

s, and the genus should be reserved for those two species only. The others appear to be anaptomorphine omomyid
Omomyid
Omomyids are a diverse group of early primates that radiated during the Eocene epoch between about 55 and 34 million years ago . Fossils of omomyids are found in North America, Europe, Asia, and possibly Africa...

s (and thus more closely related to the tarsiers than to simians) and should have a new genus erected.
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