The Glyptodon Fossil
Somewhere in Buenos Aires in Argentina, one day, when an Argentinian farmer took a leisurely stroll around his property, he was surprised to find something huge nestled into the side of a river bank.
He sent his dog to check first for he wanted to know if there were dangerous things hiding there.
Then he took a closer look and tried to excavate it with his bare hands, but he couldn’t. It turned out to be a very huge, heavy, and massive object weighing nearly 2 tons.
At first he told his wife he had found what could have been a dinosaur’s egg. They laughed and thought he was joking.
Then he decided to inform the authority to find out what it really was.
Later the matter was brought to the attention of the archaeologists and the paleontologists. The archaeologists at first doubted its authenticity because of its excellent condition and its strange position.
Some skeptic doubted how could such a massive and ancient creature remain in that pristine condition for such a long time?
But the paleontologists finally confirmed that it was really an authentic fossil of the ancient massive mammal called GLYPTODON, whose modern ancestors are the armadillos.
Their shells are used for protection, while their tails were for intra-species fighting; just like the antlers the deer are using in fighting with each other.
It was an armored mammal which lived during the Paleistocene epoch. Records show that these giants Glyptodon had lived in South and Central Africa for millions of years. They had even migrated as far in the north as Guatemala. They had co-existed with humans then for thousands of years.
It is believed that climate change and the rise of humans, who likely hunted them for their shell may have contributed to their extinction.
This articles is based on a post published in www.timetobreak.com.
All photos are taken from this same source.
