1847.] OWEN ON EXTINCT ANTHRACOTHERIOID QUADRUPEDS. 109 
According to the descriptions and figures in the ‘Ossemens Fos- 
siles,’ the generic characters of Anthracotherium could only be de- 
duced from the true molars, which were apparently at = 12: the 
upper ones haying the form above described, the lower ones being 
narrower, but supporting four conical lobes, and the last molar having 
a fifth similar lobe and a ridge behind. The number of premolars 
was uncertain ; but those that were known to Cuvier had a thick 
conical irregularly compressed crown, surrounded by a slightly pro- 
minent basal ridge. One of the anterior teeth*, either an incisor or 
a canine, had a crown terminating in a point, with sharp borders, 
convex on its outer side, and impressed on its imner side with two 
slight furrows parallel with the borders of the crown. Cuvier com- 
pares it with the lower incisors of certain Phalangers, and to the 
canines of the Camel or Tapir ; but it also, as I shall presently show, 
presents some obvious characters of resemblance with the superior 
incisors of the genus Sus. 
M. Pictet+ assigns to the Anthracotherium ‘7 molars’ (on each 
side) above and below, ‘ canines’ (=): ‘like those of the Tapir,’ 
and four incisors in the lower jaw, procumbent like those of Pigs. 
Giebel{ gives “sechs Schneide- emen Kck- und sechs Backzahue’”’ 
to the dnthracotherium, meaning probably the formula 
Bo ae) 6 
3—3’ 1-1’ 6—6 
The discovery, however, by the Abbé Croizet of an almost entire 
lower jaw of a true Anthracotherium, in Auvergne, and the trans- 
mission to the Parisian Museum of complete series of both upper 
and lower teeth, from Digoin, Moysac, and other localities of central 
and southern France, have furnished Prof. de Blainville with the 
materials for determining the true dental formula of the genus dn- 
thracotherium ; viz. 
The upper incisors are strong, with conical slightly curved crowns, 
decreasing from the first to the third: the upper canines are indi- 
cated by their sockets to be pretty large, ‘assez fortes,’ and round 
at the neck. The first molar is the smallest of all the teeth, is 
single-rooted, and situated almost equidistant from the canine and 
the second molar ||; but im the description of the figure of the 
teeth of the upper jaw of the Anthracotherium, M. de Blainville 
acknowledges that in his plate (pl. 1) ‘they are ranged by analogy 
in the order of their natural position ;’? but by what analogy is not 
stated. The extreme differences presented by the genera Dichodon 
* Loe. cit. pl. 80. figs. 6 & 7. 
tT Traité élémentaire de Paléontologie, 8vo, 1844, tom. i. p. 259. 
~ Fauna der Vorwelt, 8vo, 1847, p. 195. 
§ Ostéographie, fasc. xxi. (1846) p. 121. 
_ || “ Presque équidistante de la canine et de la seconde.” 7d. p. 128. 
