A newly described species of ancient giraffoid had a thick helmet designed for fierce headbutting.
, when food competition is highest. Another idea is that giraffes evolved longer necks for sexual competition, with male giraffes engaging in violent neck-swinging fights and longer necks attracting mates. This ‘necks for sex’ theory is sometimes contested by the fact that males don’t have longer necks than females
They describe the specimen as a previously unknown giraffe relative that lived in the Miocene, about 16.9 million years ago. It probably looked more like the short-necked African Okapi than a giraffe, and had a 5-cm thick hard structure on the top of its head made of layers of keratin. They named it, a unicorn-like creature in Chinese mythology. “This legend might derive from some fossil giraffoids,” speculates Wang.
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