Title Information

RÖSSNER, Gertrud & Kurt HEISSIG (editors)

The Miocene Land Mammals of Europe

Authors

Antonio ALCOVER, Ciutat de Mallorca, Balears, Spain

Peter ANDREWS, London, United Kingdom

Miranda ARMOUR-CHELU, Martinsville, U.S.A.

Raymond L. BERNOR, Washington D. C., U.S.A.

Thomas BOLLIGER, Zürich, Switzerland

Ellen BOON-KRISTKOIZ, Starnberg, Germany

Hans DE BRUIJN, Utrecht, The Netherlands

Remmert DAAMS, Madrid, Spain

Mary R. DAWSON, Pittsburgh, USA

Gudrun DAXNER-HÖCK, Wien, Austria

Burkart ENGESSER, Basel, Switzerland

Oldrich FEJFAR, Praha, Czech Republik

Matthijs FREUDENTHAL, Leiden, The Netherlands

Alan W. GENTRY, London, United Kingdom

Leonard GINSBURG, Paris, France

Ursula B. GÖHLICH, München, Germany

Kurt HEISSIG, München, Germany

Elmar P. J. HEIZMANN, Stuttgart, Germany

Karl Alban HÜNERMANN, Mellingen, Switzerland

Marguerite HUGUENEY, Villeurbanne, France

Daniel KÄLIN, Basel, Switzerland

Meike KÖHLER, Sabadell, Spain

Wighart VON KOENIGSWALD, Bonn, Germany

Andor R. KRISTKOIZ, Starnberg, Germany

Jan VAN DER MADE, Madrid, Spain

Elvira MARTÍN SUÁREZ, Granada, Spain

Pierre MEIN, Villeurbanne, France

Clemens MÖDDEN, Mainz, Germany

Jorge MORALES, Madrid, Spain

Salvador MOYÀ-SOLÀ, Sabadell, Spain

QIU ZHANXIANG, Beijing, China

QIU ZUDING, Beijing, China

Josep QUINTANA, Sabadell, Spain

Fred RÖGL, Wien, Austria

Gertrud E. RÖSSNER, München, Germany

Michael RUMMEL, Weißenburg, Germany

Norbert SCHMIDT-KITTLER, Mainz, Germany

Sevket SEN, Paris, France

Friedrich STEININGER, Frankfurt a.M., Germany

Gerhard STORCH, Frankfurt a.M., Germany

Engin ÜNAY, Ankara, Turkey

Wilma WESSELS, Utrecht, The Netherlands

WENYU WU, Beijing, China

Reinhard ZIEGLER, Stuttgart, Germany

Contents

Dedication

This volume is dedicated to Volker Fahlbusch by his friends, colleagues and students honoring his 65th birthday on February 22nd, 1999. Since more than 35 years he has spent his primary research activities in the field of mammal paleontology, offering his services to the international scientific community, first as a postgraduate student, then as an assistant, and finally as a professor at the Universitäts-Institut für Paläontologie und historische Geologie in Munich (Germany). Particularly the research on intraspecific variability and biochronology of European Oligocene and Miocene mammals has been influenced considerably by his studies. His work has always been accomplished by enthusiasm, conscientiousness and integrity, which made him an important, but not always an easy partner for his colleagues. However, this also made him an ideal for all his students whom he encouraged to get involved in this wonderful and exciting science.

Congratulations, dear Volker! We wish you good health for the future. Enjoy your further scientific activities!

Preface

The European Tertiary and the initial research on fossil mammals are closely related to Georges Cuvier's investigation of Tertiary quadrupeds of the Montmartre in the early 19th Century. He was the first who gave an impression of bygone mammal faunas appearing as something between strange and still familiar.

Since Cuvier's clear recognition of former time periods on earth, each with special faunas destroyed by succeeding catastrophes, collections of fossil mammals have increased immensey as well as our knowledge of them. Today, we have a reasonably detailed picture of mammalian faunas and their evolution in a comparatively precise chronological framework with a resolution of a million or even a hundred thousand years. This is the basis for further research on the European continental Tertiary in which the fossil record of the Miocene provides an important contribution. Especially during the last decades numerous mammal paleontologists have carried out extensive systematic studies of Miocene continental deposits. This has resulted in a continuous increase of informations about all groups of fossil mammals, so much so that even mammal paleontologists can hardly keep a general overview.

In this situation the idea was born to publish a special volume presenting the latest state of research on Miocene mammals of Europe. Particular attention was given to a complete documentation of all mammal groups occurring. Each chapter on a systematic group includes a general characterization and special aspects, as differentiation, evolution and ecology. It is complemented by a list of the fossil material including at least all valid species, type localities, ages, and the depositories of the types. The references are listed as clear as possible, and include preferably the more recent publications which also allow access to the older literature. In the same way the text focusses on the present knowledge rather than on historical aspects. Additional chapters deal with the chronology and paleobiogeography of the European Miocene as well as with the intercontinental relationships of its faunas. One chapter is devoted to the evolutionary history of island faunas.

Many specialists have been asked to submit contributions from their own subjects in order to realize this project. Consequently, the individual chapters reflect the personal style of each author. In this way differing scientific opinions on particular taxonomic problems may stand side by side in this volume. As mentioned above, the volume focusses on land mammal faunas of the European Miocene. However, in some cases inclusion of taxa from the Oligocene or Pliocene seemed to be appropriate, as well as from non-European localities. There are also differences in the format of the presentation of material data. It should be mentioned that tooth positions are indicated differently, reflecting the usual use in the individual groups. Generally, e.g. "M1", "M1" and "M1/" indicates an upper first molar, and e.g. "p3", "P3" and "P/3" a lower third premolar. Milk teeth are indicated as e.g. "DM" or "D" for upper teeth, respectively e.g. "dp" or "d" for lower teeth.

The abbreviations for the housing collections are used uniformly throughout the volume. The full institutional names are given at the end of the book.

The volume could not have been produced without the help of our colleagues, Dr. Winfried Werner, Dr. Ursula Göhlich, Dipl.-Geol. Markus Moser, Dr. Anne Lagally, Dr. Peter Wellnhofer, (all Munich), and Dr. Alan Gentry (London). Special thanks are due to them all. From the beginning, the publisher, Dr. Friedrich Pfeil, supported this project and performed an excellent job.

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