| Proacrodon | |
|---|---|
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| Genus: | Proacrodon Roth, 1899 |
| Type species | |
| Proacrodon transformatus Roth, 1899 | |
Proacrodon is a dubious genus of extinct mammal from South America. Its type species isProacrodon transformatus. The only known specimen, a lower premolar or molar, is now lost, and its affinities are unknown.[1]
In 1899,Santiago Roth named the new genus and speciesProacrodon transformatus on the basis of a single tooth collected in Patagonia.[2] The genus name comes from Greek πρό "before", άκρος "pointed", and όδών "tooth", and refers to the shape of the tooth, which rises higher in its anterior portion than its posterior portion.[3] Roth compared the taxon toMegacrodon, which he named in the same paper, and toHyrachyus.[2]Florentino Ameghino synonymizedProacrodon with his own genusTrimerostephanus without seeing the specimen firsthand.[1] In 1904, Palmer listed bothProacrodon andTrimerostephanos as members ofIsotemnidae.[4] In 1948George Gaylord Simpson listed the taxon as a possiblelitoptern and concluded that the taxon was anomen vanum, viewing Ameghino's proposal of synonymy withTrimerostephanos as possible but not reliable.[1]
The locality where the tooth was collected is not known with certainty, but was probably in theMusters Formation.[1]
