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Research dossier · General Reference

Guinea pig

Domesticated rodent from South America

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General referenceInterpretive dossier study · Crown Archives visual atlas
Record originEnglish Wikipedia
Text licenseCC BY-SA 4.0
Source revisionSep 14, 2026
Entity authoritySource title only
Source-derived summary

The guinea pig, also known as the domestic guinea pig, cavy or domestic cavy, is a species of rodent. It belongs to the genus Cavia, family Caviidae, and its closest wild relatives include the montane guinea pig. Domestic guinea pigs typically weigh between 700 and 1,200 g and measure between 20 and 25 cm in length; most breeds have fur, and they have long front teeth that grow continuously, leading the animals to chew regularly to wear them down. They are social animals, and are skittish in response to noise or danger, evincing a freeze or flight strategy.

Editorial summary

The public source identifies “Guinea pig” as domesticated rodent from South America. This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around Guinea, Domesticated and rodent.

Editorial reviewA practical starting point whose main value is the path it opens into stronger specialist and primary sources. The current 98-word lead offers orientation but no explicit four-digit date, so chronology should not be assumed. The selected authority fields contribute no independent date. Its value is orientation rather than verdict, with Guinea, Domesticated and rodent providing the first useful test.
Editorial analysis

Why this record matters

A short description can identify a subject without explaining its stakes. For “Guinea pig”, the useful work is to connect “domesticated rodent from South America” to the records capable of establishing context and consequence.

Evidence profile

The citation trail is more important than the brevity of the summary: it shows where individual claims can be examined in context. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 14, 2026.

Critical limits

A concise general-reference account can conceal disagreements about scope, terminology or the weight assigned to individual sources. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.

How to read it

Use the entry as an orientation point, then follow its citations and revision history. Names, dates and institutional relationships should be checked against the original record.

Best used for
  • Subject orientation
  • Search vocabulary
  • Locating named sources
Verify next

The closest primary source, responsible institution and strongest cited specialist reference.

Three-step research path

  1. Establish the record: confirm the title “Guinea pig”, its source revision and the description used here.
  2. Expand the search: follow Guinea pig primary sources, Guinea pig archive and Guinea research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
  3. Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.

Questions for further research

  1. Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “Guinea pig”?
  2. Which cited source is closest to the event, object or claim?
  3. Which institution is responsible for the underlying evidence?
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Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from “Guinea pig” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.