Blancan Carnivore Trigonictis 
21 
assignment of his new species to Galera was remarkably perceptive and 
his brief discussion of neotropical affinities of the North American Pleis- 
tocene fauna resoundingly modern. He indicated that his species differed 
from the living tayra in having an apparently “more slender muzzle,” 
relatively larger Mj-, and double-rooted Pj, among other characters. 
Nehring (1886:151-152) pointed out that, unknown to Cope, the grison 
has a metaconid in Mj-, and indicated that in relative size of this tooth and 
form of masseteric fossa. Cope’s fossil jaw more closely resembles that of 
the grison, and therefore transferred the species to Galictis. He later 
reiterated this conclusion (1901:215-216), stating that the specific charac- 
ters distinguishing Galictis macrodon from the living grison are the two- 
rooted Pj, the space between Pj and P^, and the somewhat greater dimen- 
sions of the teeth and jaw bone. Although Nehring was aware of Leidy’s 
(1869) illustration of the P- of Galera macrodon, he obvously based his 
reassignment to Galictis on Cope’s type description, based only on the 
lower jaw, as reprinted by Coues (1877), and on Leidy’s illustration of the 
lower jaw. Until now, only Schreuder (1935:89) has considered the P- of 
Galera macrodon, but, as the specimen was not available at that time, she 
was limited to Leidy’s illustration. She supported Nehring’s conclusions. 
The P- of Galictis (and Grisonella), however, differs fundamentally from 
that of Trigonictis macrodon in having a well developed basin in place of 
the protocone, bordered posteriorly by a large hypocone, especially in 
Galictis (Fig. 2C,D), a contrast noted by Zakrzewski (1967:294). Eira 
barbara is more similar to Trigonictis in development of the protocone of 
P-(Fig. 2E), but differs markedly in shape of the tooth through having the 
protocone set off from the trigon by a narrow neck (as typically devel- 
oped in mustelines and apparently as in Canimartes cumminsii). 
The Mj- of Grisonella is significantly different from those of Trigonic- 
tis, Galictis, and Eira in lacking the metaconid. Although Mj- shows 
considerable variation in the modern series available for Galictis and 
Eira, in Galictis it is relatively large, as in Trigonictis, but generally has a 
narrower talonid on which the hypoconid is more prominent and cen- 
trally placed and the basin absent or incompletely enclosed lingually; in 
Eira the Mj- is relatively small, but otherwise resembles that of Trigonictis 
in having a broad talonid with labially placed hypoconid and distinct 
basin, though generally not as fully enclosed as in Trigonictis (USNM 
104546 and many other specimens of Eira have essentially Trigonictis- 
like talonids). Schreuder (1935:88-89) quantified the relative size of Mj- by 
expressing its crown length as a multiple of that of P^ (length of My 
/length of Py)^ We have used her technique to compare relative size of Mj- 
in the series of modern galictines in USNM to that of Trigonictis, with 
the following results: 
