In paleontology, size matters. The lifestyles of the large and charismatic often gain far more attention those of smaller, equally-strange creatures that thrived alongside the leviathans during prehistory. The most massive dinosaurs, of course, are the recipients of such scale-dependent adoration, and the same is true of the great extinct rhinoceros Paraceratherium (or “Indricotherium“, or “Baluchitherium“, or “Dzungariotherium“, but I’ll get to that in a moment.)

Stretching over 26 feet long, and often said to weigh as much as five elephants, Paraceratherium has traditionally been heralded as the largest mammal ever to tromp over the Earth. The enormous rhino is practically required to make appearances in books, documentaries, and museum displays about fossil mammals. Yet, as paleontologist Donald Prothero demonstrates in