The Early to Middle Pleistocene boundary in the Baza Basin (Spain)

Abstract

The continental vertebrate fauna of Cúllar Baza-1 (Granada, Spain) occur immediately above the Matuyama/Brunhes polarity boundary, and therefore represent an initial record for the Middle Pleistocene. All polarity zones for the Late Pliocene through Middle Pleistocene are found in an 80 m section, which includes this fossil quarry. The existing collection of abundant remains of micro-mammals, macro-mammals and lithic artifacts (indicating human activity) can now be assigned an earliest Middle Pleistocene age of 0.75 Ma. Another section, 25 km across the Neogene Baza Basin, also has the Matuyama/Brunhes polarity boundary. However, in this case the Huéscar-1 fossil quarry and the Puerto Lobo sites are both below the polarity boundary, thus representing a record of the late Early Pleistocene at ∼0.9 Ma. Differences in micro-mammal species across these Matuyama/Brunhes boundaries are significant and justify an approximately coincident biostratigraphic boundary between the Biharian and Toringian stages.