Cattle were originally identified as three separate species: Bos taurus, the European or "taurine" cattle (including similar types from Africa and Asia); Bos indicus, the zebu; and the extinct Bos primigenius, the aurochs. The aurochs is ancestral to both zebu and taurine cattle. Now, these have been reclassified as one species, with Bos taurus primigenius and Bos taurus indicus. Read more ...

Fossils of hideous bovine-like animal that predated the dinosaurs is discovered   Daily Mail- June 25, 2013
A cow-like reptile that may have been one of nature's ugliest beasts roamed an isolated desert before the age of the dinosaurs. The creature's genus name - bunostegos - means 'knobby roof' and gives a clue to its appearance. About the size of a domestic cow, the plant-eater had bulbous tumor-like growths sprouting from its head and bony armor down its back.Fossils from bunostegos dating back around 260 million years to the Permian era were found in what is now northern Niger in Africa.

Cow comes in from the cold BBC - October 6, 2002
Neck bone of a 170,000-year-old giant cow found. Its discovery follows that of hippopotamus, elephant woolly mammoth fossils and woolly rhinoceros. The city's Natural History Museum has just taken in the neck bone of a 170,000-year-old giant cow found not far from the institution in Knightsbridge. Its discovery follows that of hippopotamus and elephant remains beneath Trafalgar Square, woolly mammoth fossils on the Strand and woolly rhinoceros remains under Battersea Power Station. The growing collection of Pleistocene specimens is giving scientists an extraordinary glimpse of the UK capital's freezing history. London's Ice Age past was a mystery until the late 19th Century when an unprecedented amount of building and excavation took place. As a number of fossil remains were then discovered around the city, a remarkable story unravelled exposing evidence of large-scale climatic change and animal development. The vertebra from a 170,000-year-old aurochs (Bos primigenius) was found on a building site in Knightsbridge. The three-metre-long beast is considered to be the ancestor of many modern cattle. It became extinct across Europe within the last few thousand years.