Moschidae is a family of pecoran even-toed ungulates, containing the musk deer (Moschus) and its extinct relatives. They are characterized by long "saber teeth" instead of horns, antlers or ossicones, modest size (Moschus only reaches 37 lb (17 kg); other taxa were even smaller) and a lack of facial glands. While various Oligocene and Miocene pecorans were previously assigned to this family, recent studies find that most should be assigned to their own clades, although further research would need to confirm these traits. As a result, Micromeryx, Hispanomeryx, and Moschus are the only undisputed moschid members, making them known from at least 18 Ma. The group was abundant across Eurasia and North America during the Miocene, but afterwards declined to only the extant genus Moschus by the early Pleistocene.
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Moschidae in the context of Cervidae
A deer (pl.: deer) or true deer is a hoofed ruminant ungulate of the family Cervidae (informally the deer family). Cervidae is divided into subfamilies Cervinae (which includes, among others, muntjac, elk (wapiti), red deer, and fallow deer) and Capreolinae (which includes, among others reindeer (caribou), white-tailed deer, roe deer, and moose). Male deer of almost all species (except the water deer), as well as female reindeer, grow and shed new antlers each year. These antlers are bony extensions of the skull and are often used for combat between males.
The musk deer (Moschidae) of Asia and chevrotains (Tragulidae) of tropical African and Asian forests are separate families that are also in the ruminant clade Ruminantia; they are not especially closely related to Cervidae.
Moschidae in the context of Musk deer
Musk deer can refer to any one, or all eight, of the species that make up Moschus, the only extant genus of the family Moschidae. Despite being commonly called deer, they are not true deer belonging to the family Cervidae, but rather their family is closely related to Bovidae, the group that contains antelopes, bovines, sheep, and goats. The musk deer family differs from cervids, or true deer, by lacking antlers and preorbital glands also, possessing only a single pair of teats, a gallbladder, a caudal gland, a pair of canine tusks and—of particular economic importance to humans—a musk gland.
Musk deer live mainly in forested and alpine scrub habitats in the mountains of South Asia, notably the Himalayas. They are entirely Asian in their present distribution, being extinct in Europe where the earliest musk deer are known to have existed from Oligocene deposits.
Moschidae in the context of Palaeomerycidae
The Palaeomerycidae is an extinct family of Neogene ruminants belonging to the infraorder Pecora. Palaeomerycids lived in Europe and Asia exclusively during the Miocene, coevolving with cervids, bovids, moschids, and tragulids there as part of a dramatic radiation of ruminants by the early Miocene.
Dromomerycids are sometimes considered to be subfamilies of the Palaeomerycidae, but recent research brought doubt to this, arguing that the dromomerycids lack the sutures on the skull roof that giraffomorphs (Giraffidae, Palaeomerycidae, Climacoceratidae) have for ossicone features. The similar resemblances of the two families could be the result of parallel evolution.