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Ovis gracilis sp. nov. (Artiodactyla, Bovidae) from the Lower Pleistocene of the Taurida Cave in the Crimea and History of the Genus Ovis

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Abstract

A new species, Ovis gracilis sp. nov., is described based on the study of fossil remains of Bovidae from the Lower Pleistocene of the Taurida Cave, Crimea. This not very large sheep had horn cores with homonymous torsion and short sinuses and slender metapodia. The remains of Ovis from Taurida are among the oldest in Europe and present the earliest evidence of the occurrence of Ovis in the Early Pleistocene of the Crimea. The species O. gracilis was part of the fauna of the Taurida Cave, dated to 1.8–1.5 Ma. The appearance of this species in the south of Eastern Europe might be associated with one of the early dispersal waves from Asia, along the Alpine–Himalayan belt during the global cooling just prior to the Olduvai paleomagnetic episode.

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ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

The author is grateful to A.V. Lavrov and I.A. Ermolchik (Borissiak Paleontological Institute, Russian Academy of Sciences), D.O. Gimranov (Institute of Plant and Animal Ecology, Ural Branch, Russian Academy of Sciences), and all participants in the excavations for collecting materials, as well as to F. Rivals (Catalan Institute of Human Paleoecology and Social Evolution, Spain) and M. Watabe (Waseda University, Japan) for providing the articles, R.A. Rakitov (Paleontological Institute, Russian Academy of Sciences) for the tomography of the horn core, and S.V. Bagirov (Paleontological Institute, Russian Academy of Sciences) for the photographs of the samples.

Funding

This study was supported by the Russian Science Foundation, grant no. 22-14-00214, https://rscf.ru/project/22-14-00214/.

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  1. Borissiak Paleontological Institute, Russian Academy of Sciences, 117647, Moscow, Russia

    I. A. Vislobokova

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Vislobokova, I.A. Ovis gracilis sp. nov. (Artiodactyla, Bovidae) from the Lower Pleistocene of the Taurida Cave in the Crimea and History of the Genus Ovis. Paleontol. J. 57, 573–585 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1134/S0031030123050118

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