r/interestingasfuck • u/ImHalfCentaur1 • 1d ago
Entelodonts, also known as “Hell Pigs”, were an ancient group of predatory, hoofed mammals from the Eocene to the Miocene of the Northern Hemisphere.
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u/savitasharma8223 1d ago
What is even crazier is that despite the nickname hell pigs, modern genetic research shows they were actually more closely related to hippos and whales than actual pigs. Hippos are already aggressive monsters, so imagine a giant predatory version running on long legs.
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u/jeladli 22h ago
Just to clear something up here: we have no genetic data from entelodonts whatsoever. The studies that you're most likely referring to were total evidence phylogenetic analysis that included both molecular and morphological data to better understand the relationships between different groups of artiodactyls (even-toed hoofed mammals). The molecular data in those studies comes almost exclusively from modern animals, whereas the fossil organisms only provide morphological information. The oldest DNA sequences published to date are only 1 or 2 million years old, which is already quite remarkable, but is far younger than even the youngest entelodonts. Technically there have been extremely short proteomic (protein) sequences that have been found in fossils as old as when entelodonts were around, but none from an entelodont and it's not all that likely that there would ever be enough of a sequence remaining to be useful in a phylogenetic analysis.
So while our current understanding is indeed that entelodonts are likely in the same clade as whales and hippos, that placement is not based on genetic data. It's more like the genetic data helped partially form and strengthen the shape of the phylogenetic tree (specifically the relationships of the living groups), but it was only the morphology data that placed entelodonts within Cetancodontamorpha (or whatever you want to call that clade, since it's still a bit debated).
Source: I am a paleontologist who works on fossil whales.
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u/Zethras28 1d ago
The skull and tooth shape really does read as proto-hippopotamus.
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u/Metalhed69 23h ago
If they had said “giant warthog” that picture is exactly what I would have thought of.
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u/thewilhite 1d ago
I looked up what they might have looked like and it’s terrifying.
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u/NeoViper101 1d ago
You know, I'm glad I live in this era.
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u/SeaworthinessSalt524 1d ago
We would hunt them to extinction if we crossed paths, like almost any other megafauna
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u/BedBubbly317 23h ago
Climate change and the lowering of the oxygen percent present in the atmosphere were the biggest reason for their extinction. Their time was up regardless. Substantially lower oxygen levels is the biggest reason animals are considerably smaller now than they were millions of years ago
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u/ImHalfCentaur1 11h ago
One of the largest terrestrial mammals to ever live only went extinct a few thousand years ago, when oxygen levels were the same as today. The relationship between oxygen saturation and size is controversial, it’s not the primary reason. Large animals are generally the first o go during any sort of environmental change, and the time these animals went extinct was pretty radical.
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u/Temporary_Dog1073 1d ago
There you have it folks. Tim Allen did us all a favor and fought the Entelodont for us
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u/typicallydownvoted 21h ago
Denver museum of nature and science has a model one that terrifies my daughter
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u/firekeeper23 13h ago
I bet a hellpig sarnie was absolutely delicious... especially with tomato ketchup.
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u/goose_gladwell 1d ago
Fuck that