Anthropornis nordenskjoeldi
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| Anthropornis nordenskjoeldi Wiman, 1905 |
Anthropornis nordenskjoeldi, or Nordenskjoeld's Giant Penguin, was a penguin species that lived 45–37 million years ago, during the Late Eocene and the earliest part of the Oligocene. It reached 1.7 metres in height and 90 kilograms in weight. Fossils of it have been found on Seymour Island off the coast of Antarctica and in New Zealand. By comparison, the largest modern penguin species, the Emperor Penguin, is just 1.2 m tall.
Anthropornis nordenskjoeldi had a bent joint in the wing; this indicates a carryover from its flying ancestors. Penguins were descended from grebe or loon-like ancestors, and became flightless as they became full-time swimmers.
[edit] Trivia
The giant albino penguins in H.P.Lovecraft's 1931 novel At the Mountains of Madness were fictional cave-dwelling decendants of this bird.
[edit] References
The Annotated H.P.Lovecraft, edited by S.T.Joshi
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