On the anatomy of the great anteater (Myrmecophaga jubata, Linn.) / by Professor Owen.
- Owen, Richard, Sir, 1804-1892
- Date:
- [1854]
Licence: Public Domain Mark
Credit: On the anatomy of the great anteater (Myrmecophaga jubata, Linn.) / by Professor Owen. Source: Wellcome Collection.
Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.
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![IX. On the Anatomy of the Great Anteater (Myrmecophaga jubata, Linn.). By Professor Owen, F.R.S., F.Z.S. fyc. Read July 25, 1854. The energetic administration of the Zoological Society of London, besides adding to the means of instruction and instructive recreation for the millions who reside in or visit the metropolis, is not less operative in advancing the purely scientific aims of the Fellows of the Society. Already the ‘ Transactions ’ and other publications of the Society contain the records of the organization of many rare animals, unknown, at least anatomically, before their exhibition in the Menagerie in the Regent’s Park; and in addition to former Mono- graphs, including those on the Giraffe, Phacochere, Walrus, and Rhinoceros, I have now the good fortune to be able to communicate the commencement of one on the Great Anteater of South America. The subject of the present description was a full-grown female animal which was received at the Gardens in the Regent’s Park, September 29, 1853, and there died, July 6, 1854. Contemporary notices of the peculiarities of its external form, modes of motion, particularly of its large, vertically fan-shaped, long-fringed tail, when the animal, coiled up for repose, covered itself with that portable blanket, preclude the necessity of premising much on these subjects; for information on which I may refer more particularly to the ‘Literary Gazette,’ No. 1916, for October 8, 1853, to Mr. Broderip’s most interesting Paper in the No. of ‘ Fraser’s Magazine ’ for February 1844, and to the excellent articles in the ‘ Household Words,’ and the periodical entitled ‘Excelsior.’ The weight of the entire animal at the time of its death was 62 lbs. avoirdupois. [Since communicating an account of the anatomy of this animal to the Scientific Meeting of the Zoological Society, July 25, 1854, a male Anteater of the same species (Myrmecophaga jubata), not quite fully grown, has also been examined by me, and the present memoir combines the results of both dissections.] External Peculiarities and Dermal Muscles. The following remarks on some external peculiarities, as observed in the recent animal, seemed to he worthy of recording. The length of the naked sole of the fore foot, from the base of the middle claw to the back part of the carpal pad, is five inches. The distal half of the ungual phalanx of the first toe, or ‘ pollex,’ projects from the common cutaneous sheath of the toes ; it supports a slender curved claw one inch three lines long by three lines in greatest breadth. The end of the second phalanx, with the ungual phalanx of the second toe, ‘ index,’ projects freely : the length of the exposed part of the claw is three inches, its basal diameter six](https://iiif.wellcomecollection.org/image/b22289112_0003.jp2/full/800%2C/0/default.jpg)
