Speaking of taeniodont origins, there’s another candidate: Cimolestes

Yesterday we looked at the origin of taeniodonts, like Stylinodon. and found it nested with Mustela the mink and Phoca the seal. Other workers (Lillegraven 1969, Rook and Hunter 2013) indicated that Cimolestes (Fig.1, Late Cretaceous) was a suitable ancestor to the taeniodonts. So, let’s look at Cimolestes and compare it to related taxa.

In comparison
Cimolestes is more like the basal eutherians Monodelphis and Maeilestes (Fig. 1) in having a rather slender mandible with incisors anterior to the canines. By contrast, the carnivores Martes, the martin, and Mustela (Fig. 2), and the taeniodonts, Wortmania (Fig. 3) and Stylinodon have a robust mandible, deep anteriorly with canines to the anterior and incisors between them.

Lillegraven 1969 wrote: “A smaller carnivorous species described as new of Cimolestes probably represents a primitive stage in the development of miacids, and subsequently fissiped and pinniped carnivores.” Well, we’re all in the same ballpark and thinking along similar lines. Not sure where Cimolestes nests in the LRT yet. Not much is known of it, other than jaw fragments.

References
Lillegraven JA 1969. Latest Cretaceous mammals of upper part of Edmonton formation of Alberta, Canada, and review of marsupial-placental dichotomy in mammalian evolution. Article 50 (Vertebrata 12) The U. of Kansas Paleontological Contributions. 122pp.
Rook DL and Hunter JP 2013. rooting around the eutherian family tree: the origin and relations of the Taeniodonta. Journal of Mammal Evolution. DOI 10.1007/s10914-013-9230-9

wiki/Cimolestes