科研之友
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摘要
Interpretation of the Neogene fluvial deposits of the Ur-Rhein-the Dinotheriensande-has a long history in which fossil mammals have played an ever present role. Most of the collections made prior to the 1930s consist of fossils from more than one biostratigraphic horizon, and this has obscured proper assessment of the age of the fossils from the deposits. As is usual in fluviatile deposits, there is evidence of reworking of many fossils, but most of them have probably not moved far from their original depositional locus. For many years, the Dinotheriensande deposits were correlated to the Early Pliocene (in the old sense of the term when "Pontian" was thought to be Early Pliocene), but for the past half century or so they have been correlated to the basal part of the late Miocene-the Vallesian. There has always been the suggestion that earlier deposits are present in the system, but because most of the sites have yielded remains of the equid, Hipparion (today Hippotherium), most authors have opted for a late Miocene age for the Eppelsheim Formation, which is the modern term for the Dinotheriensande. Even though Dorn-Durkheim 1 is not strictly speaking part of the Dinotheriensande, it is geographically close to the deposits traditionally included in the deposits. This contribution examines the deinothere fossils from the Mainz Basin, and compares them to rich control samples excavated from horizons or sites which span a short time interval, including Langenau (MN 4, 62 teeth), Massenhausen (MN 8, 84 teeth) and Montredon (MN 10, 190 teeth). The results indicate that there are substantial quantities of fossils of the middle Miocene age in the Mainz Basin, especially well represented at Sprendlingen (MN 6, 113 teeth) and Gau-Weinheim (Wissberg) (MN 7/8 and MN 9-10, 84 teeth). The type area of the formation at Eppelsheim, which yielded 174 teeth, includes fossil specimens that correlate to MN 4-5, while most of the fossils correlate to MN 9, and some correlate to MN 10, whereas there are a few specimens suggesting an age equivalent to MN 11. Dorn-Durkheim 1 (35 teeth) correlates to MN 11, although the presence of Anancus at the site pleads for a younger correlation (MN 12 or MN 13) (Gaziry 1997; Metz-Muller 2000). The paper probes the taxonomy of the Dorn-Durkheim 1 deinotheres and other "huge" deinotheres from the Turolian of Europe, Asia and Africa, with the aim of determining the taxonomic identification of the material from Dorn-Durkheim 1, which was previously interpreted as a form intermediate between D. giganteum and D. gigantissimum. It is concluded that it belongs to the latter species which is a junior synonym of two species names which have priority-D. proavum (Eichwald Nova Acta Phys-Med Academiae Caesareae Leopoldino-Carolinae Naturae Curiosorum, 17:677-760, 1831) and D. indicum Falconer (Q J Geol Soc Lond 1:356-372, 1845). A final aim of this article is to describe and interpret huge deinothere dental remains from Iran which help fill the geographic gap that used to separate the Eastern European Deinotherium proavum (ex D. gigantissimum) from equally large Deinotherium indicum. This discovery suggests that the huge Indian and European deinotheres belong to a single widespread species.
- 出版日期2013-6
