414 CHO3ROPOTAMU8. 



Cuvier had recognized amongst the fossil fragments 

 extracted from the gypsum at Montmartre, indications 

 of extinct genera different from the PalaotJieria and Ano- 

 plotheria, and to one of the rarest and least satisfactorily 

 represented of these he gave the name of Chosropotamus. 

 The fossil figured at the head of the present section 

 not only extends, by its association in the same deposit 

 with Pal&otheria and Anoplotheria, the analogies of the 

 eocene marls of the Isle of Wight with the gypsum beds 

 at Paris, but affords additional information of the osteology 

 and dentition of the extinct genus, which is essential to the 

 determination of its exact affinities. 



The fossil in question is the right rainus of the lower 

 jaw, with all the teeth in place, except one premolar, the 

 canine and the incisors. It was discovered by the Rev. 

 D. Fox, in the Seafield quarry, near Hyde, Isle of Wight. 



The fragments of the Chosropotamus which Cuvier * de- 

 scribes, consist of an incomplete base of the skull with six 

 molar teeth on each side, (fig. 164, A) and a small portion 

 of a ramus of the lower jaw, with the canine (?) and two 

 spurious molars. 



The form of the teeth, and the flattened surface of 

 the glenoid cavity, afford sufficient proof of the pachyder- 

 mal nature of the animal, and its close alliance to the 

 genus Sus. But the breadth of the glenoid cavity and the 

 expansion of the zygomatic arches are greater than in any 

 known species of Hog; the Peccari (Dicotyles) in these 

 respects, as in the dental details, especially in the propor- 

 tion and direction of its canine teeth, approaches nearest to 

 the fossil. 



Now the points in which the Cuvierian fossils prove that 

 the Chceropotamus deviates from the Peccari, are those 



* ' Ossemens Fossiles,' ed. 1 822, vol. iii. p. 260 ; ph. Ixviii. li. 



