Could this Sumerian statue depict an ancient extinct giraffe?

For decades , fossilist have agonized over a strange Sumerian statue find in central Iraq . The figurine draw a mammalian that some researchers distrust could be a suriving specimen of the ancient giraffe , Sivatherium .

AtTetrapod Zoology , Darren Naish gives an overview of this seven - decade - plus tilt :

Sivatherium was a large , dead - necked giraffid , originally described for S. giganteus from the Siwalik Hills of India [ … ] but later discovered at numerous sites across Africa . The African forms are now generally regarded as exemplify dissimilar species from S. giganteus [ … ]

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This figurine [ … ] is a little ( 18 cm tall ) bronze rein - gang , constructed as a palm for a four - roll chariot . Collected in 1928 on a joint Field Museum of Natural History / Oxford University expedition , it dates [ … ] to the former Early Dynastic I period and hence to c. 2800 - 2750 BC ( and not 3500 BC as given by some author ) . It very obviously depicts a ‘ tusk ’ * artiodactyl with a ring through its nose and a rope touch base the ring to the beast ’s right foreleg ( the figurine has sometimes been say to be fit with a halter , but I ca n’t see any obvious indication that anything other than a large ring is present ) [ … ]

We ’ll never really sleep with what the person who create the statuette was attempt to render , and the possibility that aesthetic license took precedence over anatomic accuracy order as likely , especially when the figurine is n’t really a couple for a sivathere or a fallow deer .

you’re able to read Naish ’s full discussion of the Sumerian statue atTetrapod Zoology . And check out his treatment of the“Egyptian pygmy mammoth . ”

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