Article · Wikipedia archive · Last revised Jul 18, 2026

Mimomys

Mimomys is an extinct genus of voles that lived in Eurasia and North America during the Plio-Pleistocene. It is believed that one of the many species belonging to this genus gave rise to the modern water voles (Arvicola). Several other prehistoric genera of vole are probably synonymous with Mimomys, including the North American Cosomys and Ophiomys.

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Jul 18, 2026
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Mimomys
Temporal range: Pliocene - Pleistocene,
Fossil jaws (IVPP V13990) of M. gansunicus, Paleozoological Museum of China
Scientific classification Edit this classification
Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Chordata
Class: Mammalia
Infraclass: Placentalia
Order: Rodentia
Family: Cricetidae
Subfamily: Arvicolinae
Tribe: Arvicolini
Genus: †Mimomys
Forsyth-Major, 19021

Mimomys is an extinct genus of voles that lived in Eurasia and North America during the Plio-Pleistocene. It is believed that one of the many species belonging to this genus gave rise to the modern water voles (Arvicola).2 Several other prehistoric genera of vole are probably synonymous with Mimomys, including the North American Cosomys3 and Ophiomys.4

Several species are known to have survived into the Late Pleistocene, including M. pyrenaicus of France5 and M. chandolensis of the Russian Far East, which may have survived as recently as 50,000 BP.6

References

References

  1. "Mimomys". Fossilworks.
  2. Gray, J.E. (1821). "On the natural arrangement of vertebrose animals". The London Medical Repository Monthly Journal and Review. 15: 296–310.
  3. "Mimomys (Cosomys) primus". Smithsonian.
  4. CHARLES A. REPENNING "Chapter 17," Bulletin of the American Museum of Natural History 2003(279), 469-512, (1 November 2003). https://doi.org/10.1206/0003-0090(2003)279<0469:C>2.0.CO;2
  5. Jeannet, Marcel; Mourre, Vincent (2013). "Mimomys pyrenaicus nov. sp. nouvel arvicolidé (Mammalia, Rodentia) dans le Pléistocène supérieur des Pyrénées (Fréchet-Aure, Hautes-Pyrénées, France)". Paleo. 24 (24): 139–147. doi:10.4000/paleo.2570.
  6. Tiunov, Mikhail; Golenishchev, F.N.; Voyta, Leonid (March 2016). "The First Finding of Mimomys in the Russian Far East". Acta Palaeontologica Polonica. 61 (1). doi:10.4202/app.00082.2014. S2CID 54511108.