First written record of the lesser panda

The first known written record of the lesser panda Ailurus fulgens is contained in a 13th-century Chinese scroll from the Chou Dynasty. This zoologically significant scroll depicts a hunting scene between this species and its human pursuers. However, the species did not become known to western science until 1821, by way of a paper concerning it that Major General Thomas Hardwicke presented that year at London's Linnean Society.

The lesser panda looks like a New World raccoon, yet shares its remarkable double thumb, proclivity for a herbivorous diet (notably bamboo) and certain dental similarities with the giant panda. Consequently, for many years both pandas were classed as the only living Old World members of the raccoon family, but modern-day genetic and biochemical analyses have confirmed that, in reality, neither of them is a raccoon after all. It has also been confirmed that they are not even closely related to each other, their similarities being due instead to convergent evolution.