Literally meaning “gravel beasts”, these guys were a group of odd toed ungulates (which includes the horses, rhinos and taipirs) that were found across Asia, Europe, N. America and Africa between 55.8 and 3.5 million years ago.
These guys would have evolved ancestors similar to small early horses, but some, such as Chalicotherium grande (shown above) would have reached sizes greater than modern day horses.
What is most striking about these dudes were their HUGE forelimbs and relatively tiny hindlimbs, completely different to any modern odd-toed ungulate we know today. Their forelimbs had long curved claws, and their knuckles were thick and well developed, much like modern day gorillas. Thus it is thought that these guys were knuckle-walkers, much like giant anteaters do today.
Clues from the teeth of these knuckle-walking horse monsters suggest that they lived as selective browsers (herbivores that feed off high growing leaves, shoots, or fruits of shrubs and trees) possibly using their bizzarely long arms and hooked claws to pull down leafy branches of trees and shrubs within the wooded savannah habitat where they lived.
