Hyaenidae (Carnivora, Mammalia) from late Miocene and Pliocene of Çalta (Ankara, Turkey)
Hyaenidae (Carnivora, Mammalia) du Miocène supérieur et du Pliocène de Çalta (Ankara, Turquie)
Résumé
The two vertebrate localities of Çalta are located about 50 km northwest of Ankara in Central Anatolia. Çalta-1 has yielded a rich early Pliocene fauna that was the subject of an exhaustive study in 1998, to which Claude Guérin contributed two articles. From this locality, Ginsburg described Chasmaporthetes kani anatolicus as a new subspecies. Re-examination of the initial material and new dental specimens makes it possible to review the systematic status of this hyena. In addition, a recently found fragment of maxillary, bearing the dental series C-M2, could be attributed to the smallest Hyaenidae, Plioviverrops cf. orbignyi, whose presence in Turkey is reported for the first time. Another locality, named Çalta-2, stratigraphically about 60 m below Çalta-1, has yielded some scarce mammalian fossils, including a mandible of Adcrocuta eximia, which is the common hyena of the Turolian Stage all over Eurasia. Mammals from these two fossiliferous horizons indicate that the sedimentary series around Çalta village encompass the late Miocene- Pliocene transition.