indica) ( Kerr, 1792)ĭistinguished from capensis by its smaller size, paler fur and having a less distinct lateral white band separating the upper white and lower black areas of the body Points taken into consideration in assigning different subspecies include size and the extent of whiteness or greyness on the back. Īs of 2005, 12 subspecies are recognised as valid taxa. In the 19th and 20th centuries, 16 zoological specimens of the honey badger were described and proposed as subspecies. More distant relatives include Eomellivora, which evolved into several different species in both the Old and New World, and the giant, long-legged Ekorus from Kenya. These include Mellivora benfieldi from South Africa and Italy, Promellivora from Pakistan, and Howellictis from Chad. A number of extinct relatives are known dating back at least 7 million years to the Late Miocene. The species first appeared during the middle Pliocene in Asia. Though not in the same subfamily as the wolverines, which are a genus of large-sized and atypical Guloninae, the honey badger can be regarded as another, analogous, form of outsized weasel or polecat. Differences between Mellivorinae and Guloninae include differences in their dentition formulae. It is much more closely related to the marten subfamily, Guloninae, and furthermore is assigned its own subfamily, Mellivorinae. Although in the 1860s it was assigned to the badger subfamily, the Melinae, it is now generally agreed that it bears few similarities to the Melinae. The honey badger is the only species of the genus Mellivora. Mellivorina was proposed as a tribe name by John Edward Gray in 1865. Mellivorae was proposed as name for the genus by Gottlieb Conrad Christian Storr in 1780. Viverra capensis was the scientific name used by Johann Christian Daniel von Schreber in 1777 who described a honey badger skin from the Cape of Good Hope. Skeleton from the Muséum national d'histoire naturelle
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