Suina
| Suina Temporal range: Late Eocene to Holocene, 33.9–0 Ma |
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| Potamochoerus porcus | |
| Scientific classification | |
| Kingdom: | Animalia |
| Phylum: | Chordata |
| Class: | Mammalia |
| Order: | Artiodactyla |
| Clade: | Artiofabula |
| Suborder: |
Suina Gray, 1868 |
| Families | |
The suborder Suina (also known as Suiformes) is a lineage of omnivorous non-ruminant artiodactyl mammals that includes the pigs and peccaries of the families Suidae and Tayassuidae and their fossil kin. Hippopotamidae had historically been classified among the Suina for morphological reasons, but is now more often classified as the sister group of the whales, or Cetacea.
The suborder Suina includes Suidae (pig family) and Tayassuidae (peccary family).
The Merycoidodonts, or "oreodonts", a branch of the tylopoda, were often considered suines due to the popular, though inaccurate, description of them as "ruminating hogs". Oreodonts were not suines, they were more closely related to camels. Similarly, the entelodonts had long been classified as members of Suina. Spaulding et al. have found them to be closer to whales, than to pigs in her Cetacodontamorpha.
Some morphological studies have suggested that the hippopotamus family Hippopotamidae was part of the Suina, but a growing body of morphological and genetic evidence has suggested that they share a common ancestor not with the Suina, but with Cetaceans—the clade that includes whales and dolphins. Whales and artiodactyls form a clade called Whippomorpha.
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Wikipedia