Kennatherium shirensis was named by Mellett and Szalay (1968). Its type specimen is AMNH 26295, a mandible (Posterior part of mandible), and it is a 3D body fossil. Its type locality is Chimney Butte, North Mesa, which is in an Eocene terrestrial horizon in the Ulan Shireh Formation of Mongolia.

It was corrected as Kennatherium shirense by Lopatin (2006).