Thrashing Threehorns - Part 3 (RGN Update #10)

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Dani liked both versions of the "antlers", so she agreed with my preference for those on the stag in Lew's size comparison illustration. We both liked the fallow-deer face, so we kept that idea. She also pointed out that Synthetoceras came later in the Miocene than Ratha's kind, so we'd be drawing its ancestor.

The protoceratids had a lot of very strange horn variations; one even sprouted six of  'em - they barely fit on his head!   So we would have a lot of leeway. 

I suggested that this ancestral form should have the fictional species name Priasynthetoceras, since Protosynthetoceras" was already taken. "Priasynth" for short.

Dani then took up the creative baton by illustrating a Priasynth doe with her male fawn. She based this on Lew's size comparison drawing stag and her own tracingof a greater kudu antelope display she photographed at a Utah wildlife museum. She added nice touches such as the little spike-horns on the youngster. Now we were really getting somewhere.

Threehornpair by rathacat



Playing Pin-the-Horns-on-the-Priasynth


Then another question popped up. In Dani's words: "Whoops!  After I uploaded this, I read some scenes from Clan Ground and Ratha and Thistlechaser, and realized that the [female threehorns] do have full nose forks.  (As a kid I *hated* it when I realized the cover artist hadn't read the book carefully... )" 

She set the stage to resolving the Priasynth doe's antler and nose-horn question in her next upload; an attempt to show a variety of head-horns and nose-horns. She also included a completely hornless head for Photoshop play and ease in doing additions or modifications in red ("redlining" in graphic-speak).

Threehorncompare by rathacat


I loved her threehorn mix-and-match kit and couldn't resist playing with it. Using an HP Touchsmart TX2 since my Gateway NV52 workhorse was down with a virus, I used the kit-bits and the tablet's drawing program to  create my version of the stag. The scribbled side-view was to clarify which way the various "antler" branches pointed.




Threehornstaghead by rathacat






To determine whether the does had nose-horns and antlers, Dani and I turned first to the books. 

Clan Ground mentions nose-horns in the scene where Orange-Eyes saves Bundi-cub from an angry threehorn doe. The book also suggests doe head-horns, when the incident is mentioned again during the debate to admit Orange-Eyes to the clan.

We then tried to find evidence of horns on female Synthetoceras skulls, but we couldn't find any fossils labeled as female.  Protoceras females, though, did have a small pair on the back of the head.

Dani added the fact that many female pronghorns and caribou have horns/antlers.

Biology and embryology also provided grounds for a dive into creative rationalization, so I took the plunge.

 Priasynths could have had horned females to defend young, as bovids and giraffids do. Priasynths may also have evolved female displays and even some degree of female selection of mates, or female dominance. 

Protoceratid female liberation!  

Embryological development in mammals first creates an essentially female fetus. When male genes kick in, the resulting hormones masculinize the embryo, changing existing female organs to male. In order for this to work, female embryos must have structures that can potentially develop as either sex. 

 Given this inherent flexibility, female protoceratids must at least had the genetic potential for making the head and nose ornaments, since the males had them.  So in the fictional Priasynth females, the potential is realized, and they do have head and nose-horns.

Here's my version of the doe:

Threehorndoehead by rathacat





I made a small compromise by giving this Priasynth doe small, slightly lyre-shaped cow-like horns, to suggest the female. The little forward-facing spikes also suggest the American pronghorn antelope.  Dani liked this doe portrait, and agreed that it did remind her of a pronghorn.  She also played a bit with the front-facing doe in a cartoon. One version had antilocaprid (antelope-goat family, in this case, pronghorn) features, while the other is primarily cervid (modern deer).

I love the way that both Tod and Dani use cartoons to visualize ideas.  They're fun, too.

 



Threehorndoeprongdeer by rathacat


We made a brief diversion into our threehorn's closest existing relatives,  giraffids. I posted reference pictures of a remarkably flex-tongued female okapi with short ossicone spikes and a bumpy-headed giraffe with longer ones. Thinking that we might later add some giraffid features to our beast, we went with what we already 
had, which was the creature's head.  Now we needed the body.

Next:  Building a Cervid (Deer) from Protoceratid Parts


[I intended to post this portion much sooner, but an unexpected (but much welcomed) opportunity for a trip to France with my 81-year-old Dad arose, and I jumped at it.  Also we live on a ranch, and the results of the California drought have been getting upfront and personal.  We've managed to adapt, but this has taken time and effort.   More about both of these items later.]



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Timcreo's avatar
Interesting.