Samotherium 2015 study found that "Samotherium" had a neck intermediate in length between the giraffe and the okapi, judging from examination of specimens of "S. major" from Greece. Samotherium Samotherium ("beast of Samos") is an extinct genus of Giraffidae from the Miocene and Pliocene of Eurasia and Africa. "Samotherium" had two ossicones on its head, and long legs. The ossicones usually pointed upward, and were curved backwards, with males having larger, more curved ossicones, though, in the Chinese species, "S. sinense", the straight ossicones point laterally, not upwards. The genus is closely related to "Shansitherium". According to biologist Richard Ellis and
Tears of the Giraffe the second and third installments of his dignified, humorous Botswanan series. In "Tears of the Giraffe", PI Precious Ramotswe tracks a missing American man whose widowed mother appeals to Ramotswe; meanwhile, the imperturbable detective is endangered at home by her fiancé's resentful maid." In a review of a later book in the series, Janet Malcolm mentions an aspect of the author's writing that shows best in this second novel of the series: "McCall Smith follows the satiric literary tradition in which a "primitive" culture is held up to show the laughable backwardness of Western society. . . . To illustrate