The Albian-Cenomanian transition in a shelf-basin transect: Biostratigraphy, sedimentology and paleontology of Jebel Mghila, Central Tunisia

Abstract

Twenty-two ammonite species are identified in the upper Albian Mortoniceras (Subschloenbachia) rostratum, Mortoniceras (Subschloenbachia) perinflatum and Stoliczkaia (Shumarinaia) africana Zones, and in the lower Cenomanian Mantelliceras mantelli Zone. The species Placenticeras Saadensis Thomas and (Thomas and Peron, 1890, 1890 is revised, including Engonoceras Thomasi Pervinquière, 1907, and is placed within the genus Hypengonoceras Spath, 1922. This accurate biostratigraphic framework allowed to evidence, at the Albian-Cenomanian transition (S. (S.) africana Zone), a significant sea level drop, responsible for emergence and erosion to the SE, and for deposition of a Lowstand wedge to the NW, fed by erosional channels on the shelf slope. Plesiosaur remains found in the upper Albian series (base of M. (S.) rostratum Zone) represent one of the few elasmosaurids known worldwide in the Albian, and the first plesiosaurian reported from Tunisia.