The 'sabre-toothed' animals that ruled before dinosaurs
Before dinosaurs, another predator with "sabre-like" teeth wandered the Earth, biting each other and warring.
They were known as gorgonopsians, or gorgons, and were the dominant species 299 million to 251 million years ago - a time known as the Permian period.
A new study presented to the Society of Vertebrate Paleontology's annual conference last week concluded the fierce carnivores likely took part in ritualised fights.
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The gorgonopsians were the largest predators of their time, their sizes ranged from that of a cat to a hippo. Matt Celeskey
The goal was not killing the other, but to win social benefits like dominance, desirable mates or territory.
Researchers came to conclusion after analysing a fossilised gorgon skull with a broken tooth embedded in the snout.
The skull was originally found in the Karoo desert in 1940 near Cape Town in South Africa.
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The skull was originally found in the 1940s. Benoit, J. et al
Researchers only discovered the healed bite mark this year. The tooth was not one of the front 'sabres'. Benoit, J. et al
The bite mark was only discovered this year as the skull had healed over.
Researchers said they believed the animal lived for another two to nine weeks after the bite, which is not the presumed cause of death as it showed signs of healing and no indication of infection.
Lead researcher Julien Benoit, a senior researcher of paleontology at the Evolutionary Studies Institute of the University of the Witwatersrand told Live Science the find shows complex biting behaviours are much older than thought.
Researchers believe the bite did not kill the animal as it had started to heal over and showed no signs of infection. S. Vrard.
"If we are right saying that this bite is the result of ritualised face-biting between two gorgonopsians of the same species, then this is the first evidence of social biting behaviour in a non-mammalian synapsid," he said.
"(Ritualised biting is) not unique to mammals and dinosaurs, but were more generalised and are older than previously thought."
Today adult mammals and reptiles bite each other for numerous reasons including to display dominance and stimulate ovulation.
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