Ptolemais 1: Ruscinian, Greece

List of taxa
Where & when
Geology
Taphonomy & methods
Metadata & references
Taxonomic list
Mammalia - Talpidae
Desmana sp. Guldenstaedt 1777
51 specimens
    = Desmana verestchagini Topachevski 1961
Rümke 1985
Desmanella sp. Engesser 1972
2 specimens
Mammalia - Soricidae
Soricidae indet. Fischer 1814
3 specimens
Mammalia - Lagomorpha - Ochotonidae
Prolagus michauxi
2 specimens
Mammalia - Rodentia - Sciuridae
Hylopetes sp. Thomas 1908
1 specimen
Mammalia - Rodentia - Castoridae
Castor fiber Linnaeus 1758
2 specimens
Mammalia - Rodentia - Muridae
Micromys bendai n. sp. van de Weerd 1979
Micromys steffensi n. sp. van de Weerd 1979
60 specimens
Rhagapodemus hautimagnensis
11 specimens
Apodemus dominans
27 specimens
Occitanomys brailloni Michaux 1969
1 specimen
unclassified
Promimomys insuliferus Kowalski 1958
219 specimens
recombined as Polonomys insuliferus
see common names

Geography
Country:Greece State/province:Macedonia
Coordinates: 40.5° North, 21.7° East (view map)
Paleocoordinates:40.4° North, 21.5° East
Basis of coordinate:based on nearby landmark
Time
Period:Neogene Epoch:Pliocene
10 m.y. bin:Cenozoic 6
Key time interval:Ruscinian
Age range of interval:5.33300 - 3.10000 m.y. ago
Stratigraphy
Local section:Coal Containing Series Local bed:Main Field
Regional section:Amintheon-Ptolemais-Kozani Basin
Stratigraphy comments: Pliocene, Early Ruscinian, MN14. 'The A-P-K basin is part of a graben system running in a NW-SE direction from Bitola (Yugoslavia) to Servia. It is suggested that Quaternary faulting caused the fractioning into the Bitola-Florina, the A-P-K and the Kozani-Servia sub-basins.' The Neogene and Pleistocene deposits have been divided into three series, the Basal Series, the Coal Containing Series (subdivided into a. main field beds, b. intermediate sequence and c. south field beds) and the Top Series. 'The main field consist of about 30metres of lignite with intercalations of calcareous muds and lignitic clays. The number and the thicknesses of these intercalations vary from locality to locality. The lignite is well layered and contians a few macroscopic plant remains, xylite is rare. The coal beds contain a variable amount of clay. Molluscs are abundantly present in many coal beds. Intercalated calcareous beds have thicknesses of up to 0.5m; most beds are rich in molluscs and some contain root imprints. A 10 to 20cm thick level of yellowish sand is present in both mines and observed in most boring. This guide level is called layer 9 by the local miners. The site is in the Main field bed, about 8m above layer 9 and 'is a lens within the lignite, it has a thickness of 20cm and a horizontal extension of 4 metres.'
Lithology and environment
Primary lithology:grading,black lignite
Lithology description: 'It consists of coal particles, molluscs and vertebrate remains in a clayey matrix and grades upwards into thinly layered black lignitic clay with abundant fishbones on the bedding planes.'
Environment:mire/swamp
Geology comments: 'The palynology of the Ptolemais lignites points to a depositional environments of reed-marshes and swamps, with or without some clumps of trees.'
Taphonomy
Modes of preservation:coprolite
Size of fossils:mesofossils
Collection methods and comments
Collection excludes:some microfossils
Collection methods:selective quarrying,chemical,sieve,field collection
Minimum sieve size:0.500
Reason for describing collection:taxonomic analysis
Collection method comments: Excavated in 1976 and 1977 by the State University of Utrecht and the Niedersachsisches Landesamt fur Bodenforschung, Hannover.
Metadata
Database number:35086
Authorizer:A. Turner, L. van den Hoek Ostende Enterer:H. O'Regan, L. van den Hoek Ostende
Modifier:H. O'Regan Research group:PACED
Created:2003-11-03 04:40:35 Last modified:2003-11-03 09:10:58
Access level:the public Released:2003-11-03 04:40:35
Creative Commons license:CC BY
Reference information

Primary reference:
9439.PACED A. van de Weerd. 1979. Early Ruscinian rodents and lagomorphs (Mammalia) from the lignites near Ptolemais (Macedonia, Greece). Proceedings Koninklijke Nederlandse Akademie van Wetenschappen (Serie B) 82:127-170 [A. Turner/H. O'Regan/L. van den Hoek Ostende]

Secondary references:

23416 C. G. Rümke. 1985. A review of fossil and recent Desmaninae (Talpidae, Insectivora). Utrecht Micropaleontological Bulletins 4:1-241 [L. van den Hoek Ostende/L. van den Hoek Ostende]