Jackal

Source: Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.
For other uses, see Jackal (disambiguation).
"Thos" redirects here. For the beast in heraldry, see theow.
Jackal
Golden jackal ("Canis aureus")
Golden jackal (Canis aureus)
Scientific classificationEdit this classification
Domain: Eukaryota
Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Chordata
Class: Mammalia
Order: Carnivora
Family: Canidae
Subfamily: Caninae
Tribe: Canini
Subtribe: Canina
Species referred to as jackals
  • Lupulella adusta
  • Lupulella mesomelas
  • Canis aureus

Jackals are

golden wolf
(Canis lupaster) was also formerly considered as a jackal.

While they do not form a

crepuscular
, most active at dawn and dusk.

Their most common

marking landmarks around the territory with their urine and feces. The territory may be large enough to hold some young adults, which stay with their parents until they establish their own territories. Jackals may occasionally assemble in small packs
, for example, to scavenge a carcass, but they normally hunt either alone or in pairs.

Etymology

The English word "jackal" dates back to 1600 and derives from the French chacal, from Turkish çakal, derived from the Persian شغال shoghāl, which is in turn derived from the Sanskrit शृगाल śṛgāla meaning "the howler".[1][2]

Taxonomy and relationships

The extant wolf-like canids
Phylogenetic relationships between the extant wolf-like clade of canids based on mitochondrial DNA.[3][4]

Similarities between jackals and coyotes led

Angel Cabrera, in his 1932 monograph on the mammals of Morocco, questioned whether or not the presence of a cingulum on the upper molars of the jackals and its corresponding absence in the rest of Canis could justify a subdivision of that genus. In practice, Cabrera chose the undivided-genus alternative and referred to the jackals as Canis instead of Thos.[5]

Oken's Thos theory was revived in 1914 by Edmund Heller, who embraced the separate genus theory. Heller's names and the designations he gave to various jackal species and subspecies live on in current taxonomy, although the genus has been changed from Thos to Canis.[5]

The wolf-like canids are a group of large carnivores that are genetically closely related because they all have 78

karyologically indistinguishable from each other, and from the dhole and the African hunting dog.[7][8] The two African jackals are shown to be the most basal members of this clade, indicating the clade's origin from Africa.[3] Canis arnensis arrived in Mediterranean Europe 1.9 million years ago and is probably the ancestor of modern jackals.[9]

The paraphyletic nature of Canis with respect to

Cuon has led to suggestions that the two African jackals should be assigned to different genera, Schaeffia for the side-striped jackal and Lupulella for the black-backed jackal[10][11] or Lupulella for both.[11][12]

The intermediate size and shape of the Ethiopian wolf has at times led it to be regarded as a jackal, thus it has also been called the "red jackal" or the "Simien jackal".

Species

Species Binomial authority Description Range
Black-backed jackal
Lupulella mesomelas

Schreber, 1775 The most lightly built jackal, once considered to be the oldest living member of the genus Canis,[13] it is now placed in the genus Lupulella. It is the most aggressive of the jackals, being known to attack animal prey many times its own weight, and it has more quarrelsome intrapack relationships.[14] Southern Africa and eastern coast of Kenya, Somalia, and Ethiopia
Side-striped jackal
Lupulella adustus
 Sundevall, 1847 It primarily resides in wooded areas, unlike other jackal species. It is the least aggressive of the jackals, rarely preying on large mammals.[15] Central and southern Africa
Golden jackal
Canis aureus
 Linnaeus, 1758 The largest and most widespread of the jackals, it is more closely related to wolves than to African jackal species.
Southeastern Europe, Middle East, western Asia, and South Asia

Folklore and literature

Like

hyenas.[16]

In the Indian Panchatantra stories, the jackal is mentioned as wily and wise.[17] In Bengali tantrik tradition, they represent the goddess Kali. It is said she appears as jackals when meat is offered to her.

The

Roog, the supreme deity of the Serer people.[18]

References

  1. ^ "jackal". The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language.
  2. ^ Harper, Douglas. "jackal". Online Etymology Dictionary.
  3. ^
    PMID 16341006
    .
  4. ^
    PMID 26234211
    .
  5. ^ a b "None". Archived from the original on April 16, 2008.
  6. PMID 8337763
    .
  7. ISBN 978-0-520-24638-6
    .
  8. PMID 7151489
    .
  9. ISSN 0277-3791
    .
  10. S2CID 84733263
    .
  11. ^
    S2CID 86650539
    .
  12. ^ Viranta, S., Atickem, A., Werdelin, L., & Stenseth, N. C. (2017). Rediscovering a forgotten canid species. BMC Zoology, 2(1), 6.
  13. ISBN 978-0-563-20844-0
    .
  14. ISBN 978-0-520-08085-0
    .
  15. ^ "Side-Striped Jackal" (PDF). Canids.org. Archived from the original (PDF) on 2009-02-20. Retrieved 2010-03-19.
  16. ^ "Jackal", classic.net.bible.org; accessed 26 February 2015.
  17. ISBN 9788184752779
    .
  18. Konrad Adenauer Stiftung
    , pp. 45–50
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Further reading

External links
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