Paramachairodus ogygya

An illustaration of Paramachairodus ogygya, a grand ancestor of the world famous saber-toothed tiger(Smilodon).
This was in a way, a true “saber-toothed panther”.

Paramachairodus ogygya is one of the oldest known true saber-toothed cats of the subfamily Machairodontinae, endemic to Eurasia during the late Miocene from 15 to 9 Ma. A large number of fossils were discovered in Cerro Batallones, a Late Miocene fossil site near Madrid, Spain.

: Physique:
The animal was about the size of a small leopard(58 cm high at the shoulder) but when compared with the leopard, it had proportionally longer hind limbs and back and proportionally stouter, more robust forelimbs(probably looked similar to those of jaguars or Megantereon).
Above facts indicate that the standing posture of P. ogygya can be regarded as ‘foreword inclined’ in stark contrast to ‘hyena-like’ posture of later Smilodon species and Homotherines.

:Skull:
According to Per Christiansen(2008), Paramachairodus lacked most of the cranio-mandibular modifications present in advanced saber-toothed felids(such as Smilodon, Homotherium, Megantereon and Xenosmilus) and whether or not paramachairodus-grade machairodonts employed a typical canine slash-bite when dispatching prey is still unclear. However, Christiansen’s comparison of craniomandibular morphology of the extant clouded leopard and P. ogygya reveals numerous similarities between them(from relative canine length to skull shapes to functional morphologies) and subsequent divergence from skulls of today’s big cats as well.

:Future clouded leopard?:
The above theory leads some to believe the possibility that neofelis nebulosa / diardi will eventually evolve into more derived, “true” saber-toothed type predators in the far distant future. However the disproportionately long back that can be seen in paramachairodus was a primitive felid morphology directly inherited from one of earliest members of the family, Pseudaelurus and so the physique of the future clouded leopard may not be exactly like P. ogygya, even if we suppose the(rather fantastic) theory become true.

We must of course, assure the future of endangered clouded leopards first, in order for them to survive that much!