Subfamily Platacanthomyinae Alston, 1876 . Proc. Zool. Soc. Lond., 1876:81.

COMMENTS: Diagnosis, general characteristics, and natural history provided by Carleton and Musser (1984), who also referenced changes in allocation of subfamily from Myoxidae to Muridae, and explained why platacanthomyines are not dormice. Closest relatives of Platacanthomys and Typhlomys are two species of Neocometes from European Miocene (Carleton and Musser, 1984), and a third species from Lower Miocene in N Thailand (Mein et al., 1990). " Platacanthomys and Typhlomys, although chracterized by many specialized features, appear to be relicts of an assemblage that is recognizable as platacanthomyine as far back as the early Miocene, a group that may have had its origins in some primitive and as yet unknown Eocene or Oligocene [muroid] stock, probably in Asia" (Carleton and Musser, 1984:368).