Mammal
Purgatorius
New findings led to a revision of the attribution of some teeth to the boundary between the Cretaceous and Paleocene.
The small teeth of Purgatorius provide clues to the beginnings of the primate lineage.
Three stages. One companion.
Game artwork
AI-generated, stylized game illustrations. These designs and growth stages are imaginative, not scientific reconstructions.
Purgatorius at a glance
- Diet
- Insects and fruit (proposed)
- Tooth shape has been used to investigate a diet containing insects and plant foods.
- When it lived
- Paleogene
- Group
- Plesiadapiformes
- Plesiadapiforms
- Fossil locations
- Montana, Colorado, Saskatchewan
- Places where fossils have been found
Beyond the game
The real Purgatorius
It is usually interpreted as one of the first representatives of the lineage that leads to primates. Its small dental remains document mammals close to the beginning of the Paleocene.
New discoveries have changed some identifications of teeth near the Cretaceous–Paleocene boundary. To place a tooth in time, scientists need to identify both the animal it belonged to and the layer in which it was found.
This grouping describes evolutionary relationships. Its members share ancestors; they do not form a chain in which one must turn into another.
Fossil discoveries
Selected fossil records · present-day map
Map references
Map: Natural Earth, public domain. Fossil records: linked collections and publications.A note on the science
It is usually interpreted as one of the first representatives of the lineage that leads to primates. Its small dental remains document mammals close to the beginning of the Paleocene.
Sources & text credits
Explore the references behind this profile.
- Purgatorius
Wikipedia contributors · Spanish source
Educational text adapted and translated from this article by Wikipedia contributors. The revision link, when captured in the source catalogue, identifies the source version.
- Purgatorius
Wikipedia contributors · English source
Educational text adapted and translated from this article by Wikipedia contributors. The revision link, when captured in the source catalogue, identifies the source version.
- Plesiadapiforms
Wikipedia contributors · English source
Educational text adapted and translated from this article by Wikipedia contributors. The revision link, when captured in the source catalogue, identifies the source version.
Educational text adapted in English from the existing Wikipedia-backed Dinosgacha catalogue and linked articles by Wikipedia contributors.
Existing English translations have been selected and arranged for this encyclopedia. Repeated period and diet text is omitted where those fields already carry it. Unknown facts remain unfilled; unreviewed geological age phrases are omitted and period labels replace numerical ages.
The adapted educational text is available under CC BY-SA 4.0. This text license does not apply to the game illustrations.