Early Pleistocene large-mammal assemblage associated with Gigantopithecus at Chuifeng Cave, Bubing Basin, South China

Abstract

ABSTRACT Chuifeng Cave is one of the typical representatives of the Gigantopithecus-bearing mammalian assemblages in southern China. The Chuifeng mammalian assemblage, including 92 Gigantopithecus blacki teeth fossils, is important to construct the biochronological and paleobiogeographic framework for the Pleistocene mammalian assemblage in mainland Southeast Asia. Except for the G. blacki teeth fossils, the left 721 identified mammalian fossils have never been described in detail until now. Here, we present taxonomic descriptions of the rest mammalian fossils from Chuifeng Cave. The Chuifeng mammalian assemblage consists at least of 28 large mammal taxa, including the Neogene relict species, Sinomastodon sp. and Hippopotamodon ultimus, and the species for their first appearances in the Pleistocene, Hystrix magna, Stegodon huananensis, Ailuropoda microta, Rhinoceros fusuiensis, Tapirus sanyuanensis, Sus peii, Sus xiaozhu, Cervus fenqii and Megalovis guangxiensis. Comparisons to already-dated early Pleistocene mammalian assemblages in southern China indicate that the age of this assemblage is around 1.9 Ma, which is consistent with the ESR/U-series and paleomagnetic dating results. The occurrences of Equus in the Chuifeng, Liucheng Gigantopithecus, Longgudong and Longgupo sites imply that G. blacki may survive in an open woodland environment with grasslands nearby in the middle and north parts of southern China.