Portrait of an Ugly Therapsid

One of the best things about very odd animals is that they tend to inspire a lot of interpretations and illustrations because they tend to spark the imagination. Estemmenosuchus certainly inspires fantastical illustrations; Dinocephalian fossils have a tendency to inspire fantastical illustrations because a number of them possess very intriguing and unique skulls. The reconstructed skeleton of Estemmenosuchus is equally intriguing; we will not look at illustrations only today however.

©Dmitry Bogdanov

It is important to note that the realistic nature of illustrations can be affected by the type of illustration we are looking at. Dmitry Bogdanov's style, like Nobu Tamura's, is very soft and often portrays the animal in sterile conditions on white backgrounds; this is not true for all of either artist's illustrations. However, this is not detrimental to the art and, in fact, the implied simplicity of the illustration of this Estemmenosuchus uralensis alows us to more thoroughly take in the entire animal and appreciate the posture, the size of the head, and the stout character of the overall animal. Estemmenosuchus, as we knew before seeing the animal as portrayed here, was a sprawling and squat animal with large canine teeth, which are very visible here. This illustration is labeled as a male animal. The largest canines are used as evidence to support hypotheses of sexual dimorphism in Estemmenosuchus in at least one paper.

©Vladimir Nikolov

More realistic appearances of Estemmenosuchus are as reliant on a stark and bold illustration style as the first is on a softer and cooler colored style. These are most realized in the line drawings that accompany the description papers, but can also be found in the styles of artists like Raul Martin, Dinoraul, and Walter Myers. The illustration included here as a representative of the more realistic appearing (because of its hard lines and high contrast as well as lack of soft tones) was drawn by Vladimir Nikolov. The description of this piece by the artist states that the scene depicts two male members of the genus are engaged in territorial combat. The fierce looking faces and skulls of the animals were apparently not enough to warn one another off from actual physical fighting, as we see in many extant species today.