A new elephantoid dental specimen from the Miocene of Krusevac basin in Central Serbia

Katarina Bradic-Milinovic,Predrag Radovic

doi:10.2298/gabp1802001r

Abstract

Elephantoid cheek teeth from the late Early and Middle Miocene of Europe frequently display mixtures of bunodont and zygodont features, making their taxonomical attributions difficult and subjective. Today, these teeth with ?intermediate? morphologies are attributed either to the mammutid species Zygolophodon turicensis, or to the gomphothere genus Gomphotherium - as a variation of G. angustidens or as a separate species G. subtapiroideum. This paper presents one such specimen, a fragmented lower third molar which originated from Miocene sandstones within the Krusevac Basin (possibly from the village of Bela Voda) in Central Serbia. We described the fossil and examined its metric properties in comparative context. Furthermore, we applied the semiquantitative method of WANG et al. (2016) in order to reduce subjectivity in our assessment of the degree of specimen?s zygodonty. Our results suggested that the specimen resembles Z. turicensis more closely than either G. angustidens and G. subtapiroideum, both in terms of the metrics and the degree of zygodonty. However, we were not able to make a firm taxonomical attribution, due to the fact that the specimen represents an isolated and incomplete fossil.

Highlights

Throughout the most of the Miocene epoch, proboscideans were well represented in Europe by deinotheres and diverse forms of “mastodonts” (GÖHLICH, 1999, 2010)
Among the members of superfamily Elephantoidea GRAY, 1821, there is a major morphological distinction based on the form of cheek dentition, which are differentiated between the so-called bunodont and zygodont patterns
We applied an adjusted z-score analysis, which allows the comparison of Gomphotherium and the mammutid Zygolophodon, which were among the earliest proboscideans to arrive in Europe at the end of MN3, with the record of the deinothere Prodeinotherium bavaricum from Lesvos island (Greece) as early as MN3b (KOUFOS et al, 2003)

Summary

Introduction

Throughout the most of the Miocene epoch, proboscideans were well represented in Europe by deinotheres and diverse forms of “mastodonts” (mammutids, gomphotheres, amebelodonts, and choerolophodonts) (GÖHLICH, 1999, 2010). Among the members of superfamily Elephantoidea GRAY, 1821, there is a major morphological distinction based on the form of cheek dentition, which are differentiated between the so-called bunodont and zygodont patterns. PREDRAG RADOVIĆ & KATARINA BRADIĆ-MILINOVIĆ boscidean fossils (PETKOVIĆ, 1926; PAVLOVIĆ et al, 1977; MARKOVIĆ et al, 2004). The specimen reported represents an accidental find by a local, so the exact geographical location and the stratigraphic provenance of the fossil remains unknown. There is a distinct possibility that the specimen originated from the lacustrine sediments in Bela Voda village near Kruševac (Fig. 1), recently dated to MN5-6 (MARKOVIĆ, 2008)

Materials and methods

Discussion

Conclusions