Skulls, Skeletons, Canines & Claws

[tigerluver]

(07-22-2021, 07:24 AM)GrizzlyClaws Wrote: @tigerluver 

Isn't the AP diameter of the lower canine on the Kahayan mandible something like 36 mm? Maybe the length of the lower canine is significantly longer for the Kahayan mandible.

I also notice that, and another classic example should be Panthera zdanskyi that also got narrow skull but very tall and squared mandible.

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35.2 mm is the official measurement at the crown root and of course it would be thicker within the hidden part of the tooth. It's hard to measure the canine length of the specimen at the base of the crown root because the mandible is completely missing from the anterior end. As such, the measurement is best on an educated guess of where the the complete symphysis would have been around the canine. 


Great point on P. zdanskyi. It seems like the traits that are unique to cave lions are not necessarily exclusive to cave lions, but rather a primitive trait within the Panthera genus. Such narrow skulls will not produce as much bite force, so the mandible must be growing dorsoventrally for some other reason. Maybe primitive cats moved their heads up and down while biting while extant cats have more a side to side motion. P. palaeosinensis also has that big, blocky mandible:

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