Abstract
Los depósitos del Mioceno inferior de la formación Hiwegi, en la Isla de Rusinga (Kenia), han proporcionado un espécimen aislado de un pequeño félido. Esta pieza, identificada aquí como holotipo de un nuevo género y especie, es del tamaño del félido actual más pequeño. Presenta algunos caracteres de los félidos primitivos de “grado Pseudaelurus”, pero también rasgos tanto métricos como morfológicos que son intermedios entre este grado y los Felidae modernos, sugiriendo que se trata de un taxón transicional. Por el contrario, Diamantofelis y Namafelis de Namibia, aunque de morfología aberrante, son más claramente del “grado Pseudaelurus”. El espécimen de Rusinga es el félido más derivado del Mioceno inferior.
Highlights
The earliest history of the Felidae in Africa is brief yet difficult to interpret
Other records of early Felidae in Africa, such as Pseudaelurus africanus (Andrews, 1914) are currently referred to Afrosmilus, which is considered to belong to the distinct family Barbourofelidae (Morales et al, 2001)
Given the very small size of the specimen, we can limit our comparisons to only a few taxa: living species of the genus Felis, especially those with African distributions: F. silvestris lybica, F. chaus, F. margarita, and F. nigripes; the smallest species of “Pseudaelurusgrade”, Styriofelis turnauensis, and the recently described S. vallesiensis (Salesa et al, in press); and the only other African Felidae of ‘Pseudaelurus-grade’ - Diamantofelis ferox and Namafelis minor (Morales et al, 2003, Morales et al, 1998)
Summary
The earliest history of the Felidae in Africa is brief yet difficult to interpret. From ca 12.5 Ma (middle Serravallian) onwards there is a reasonably continuous record, including taxa such as Machairodus that are well known from other continents (Sardella & Werdelin, 2007; Werdelin & Peigné, 2010). The relationships of the Arrisdrift species to other felids and, the question of whether they are felids at all [and not very aberrant barbourofelids - cf (Werdelin et al, 2010)], are still moot In this communication I report on a third felid specimen from the Burdigalian of Africa. Despite having been recovered in 1949 (according to the field number), this specimen has only been mentioned in the paleontological literature once (Werdelin & Peigné, 2010) - erroneously as coming from Songhor - and only as Felidae indet It was not discussed in either of the two previous works on lower Miocene carnivores from eastern Africa (Savage, 1965, Schmidt-Kittler, 1987). The specimen shows a number of interesting traits and opens up new possibilities regarding the early evolution of Felidae in general and Felinae (the extant cats) in particular
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