According to Mother Nature Network, a fossilized skull of the ancient progenitor of the modern rhinoceros, Elasmotherium sibiricum, has recently been discovered in the Pavlodar Priirtysh region of northeast Kazakhstan. Radiocarbon Accelerator Mass Spectrometry analysis dated the fossil to be about 29,000 years old. This means that the animal, believed to have become extinct about 350,000 years ago, was alive at the same time as early humans.
E. sibiricum, dubbed "The Siberian unicorn," was a large rhinoceros-like mammal, measuring up to 6.5 feet tall and about 15 feet long. It had an impressively large single horn, up to several feet long. Existing as early as 2.5 million years ago, the creature likely appeared as something in between the modern rhinoceros and a wooly mammoth. Its habitat was the vast territory from the Don River in Russia to east of modern Kazakhstan. E. sibiricum disappeared from most of its original habitat long ago, with, presumably, only the Siberian population remaining long enough to meet our ancestors.
Andrey Shpanski, a paleontologist at Tomsk State University, explains: "Most likely, the south of Western Siberia was a refúgium, where this rhino persevered the longest in comparison with the rest of its range. There is another possibility that it could migrate and dwell for a while in the more southern areas."
Humans, on the other hand, are believed to have inhabited the territory of modern Siberia as early as 35,000 years ago. This means that for at least 6,000 years humans lived with an ancient giant that was originally presumed by paleontologists to have disappeared much earlier.
The discovery has been detailed in the American Journal of Applied Science.
