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Lorisidae is a group of strepsirrhines that comprises the Asian lorises, the African pottos (including angwantibos) and their closest fossil relatives. As a group, extant lorisids are not very speciose, with 15 species currently identified (10 species of loris and 5 of potto; see Table 3.1; see for example, Chapter 6)(Pozzi et al., 2015). The biogeographic and phylogenetic contexts of the evolutionary origin of lorisids have long been a matter of debate, without any clear resolution (Pickford, 2012). The main reason why there are only slow improvements in this research area is because lorises are rare in the African and Asian fossil record. Only seven species have been named (Table 3.1), suggesting that either lorisids have been a poorly diverse group throughout their evolutionary history, or that there is a hidden lorisid diversity yet to be uncovered beneath the forests of continental Africa and South and South-east Asia.

The aim of this chapter is to review current knowledge about lorisid evolution, and to discuss how the fossils known for the group inform our understanding of the timing and context of major evolutionary transitions relevant to lorisids. To do that, we first review phylogenetic studies that have contributed to the understanding of the relationships among lorisids and strepsirrhines more generally. Then we provide a temporal framework combining molecular and palaeontological data to identify the temporal gaps in the fossil record. These gaps might hold the key to future research on this topic and lead us to discuss where and when we can expect to find fossils in the coming years. Finally, we summarise the current understanding of fossil lorisid …