TY - JOUR
T1 - New Remains of Lophiaspis Maurettei (Mammalia, Perissodactyla) from the Early Eocene of France and the Implications for the Origin of the Lophiodontidae
AU - Vautrin, Quentin
AU - Tabuce, Rodolphe
AU - Lihoreau, Fabrice
AU - Bronnert, Constance
AU - Gheerbrant, Emmanuel
AU - Godinot, Marc
AU - Metais, Gregoire
AU - Yans, Johan
AU - Dutour, Yves
AU - Vialle, Nicolas
AU - Philip, Jean
AU - Billet, Guillaume
N1 - Funding Information:
This paper is dedicated to the memory of Henri-Pierre Labarrère, an amateur paleontologist who dedicated part of his life to the study of lophiodontids. We first want to thank the Rougier family, owner of the site, who kindly provided access, help and support for paleontological research on the locality of Palette. Preparation of several specimens was done by E. Zoukouba (Ecole Pratique des Hautes Etudes, Paris), R. Vacant (Museum National d’Histoire Naturelle) and A.L. Charruault (Institut des Sciences de l'Evolution de Montpellier). 3D data acquisitions were performed using the µCT facilities of the MRI platform member of the national infrastructure France-BioImaging supported by the French National Research Agency (ANR-10-INBS-04, «Investments for the future»), and of the Labex CEMEB (ANR-10-LABX-0004) and NUMEV (ANR-10-LABX-0020). Recent excavations at Palette and scans of the material were funded thanks to the Actions Transversales du Muséum (ATM Palette, MNHN funding). We thank E. Turini and L. Mohring for their valuable help during the excavations. We are indebted to S. Jiquel (Université de Montpellier, France), C. Argot (Muséum national d’Histoire naturelle, Paris, France), E. Robert (Université Claude Bernard Lyon 1, France), O. Wings (GeiseltalMuseum, Halle, Germany), L. Costeur (Naturhistorisches Museum Basel, Switzerland) and J. Galindo (Institut Català de Paleontologia Miquel Crusafont, Sabadell, Spain) who gave us access to the collection in their care.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2021, by the Society of Vertebrate Paleontology.
PY - 2021/3/19
Y1 - 2021/3/19
N2 - The Lophiodontidae are endemic perissodactyls from Europe that flourished during the Eocene. Despite their preponderance in the European fossil record, their exact origin and relationships within the perissodactyls remain unknown due to the rare and fragmentary material in the early Ypresian, the time of their earliest radiation. Lophiaspis maurettei is the oldest and earliest diverging lophiodontid known to date but is unfortunately poorly known. We describe here the results of new excavations of the type locality of Palette. Important new material including complete skulls, mandibles, post-cranial elements and juvenile specimens lead us to revise Lophiaspis maurettei from Palette and other localities and to describe novel morphology for this species. According to an original phylogenetic analysis, based on a revised matrix of dental, cranio-mandibular and postcranial characters, Ls. maurettei is an early diverging lophiodontid morphologically close to Protomoropus and Paleomoropus, two basal chalicotheres, known from Asia and North America, respectively. Our resulting topology does not support the previously proposed inclusion of the lophiodontids within the Ceratomorpha and supports a position within the suborder Ancylopoda, close to some Eomoropidae representatives. These results imply that Ls. maurettei was restricted to Southern Europe during the early Eocene, which would be compatible with an Asian origin for lophiodontids in accordance with the evolutionary history of other perissodactyls and placental mammals.
AB - The Lophiodontidae are endemic perissodactyls from Europe that flourished during the Eocene. Despite their preponderance in the European fossil record, their exact origin and relationships within the perissodactyls remain unknown due to the rare and fragmentary material in the early Ypresian, the time of their earliest radiation. Lophiaspis maurettei is the oldest and earliest diverging lophiodontid known to date but is unfortunately poorly known. We describe here the results of new excavations of the type locality of Palette. Important new material including complete skulls, mandibles, post-cranial elements and juvenile specimens lead us to revise Lophiaspis maurettei from Palette and other localities and to describe novel morphology for this species. According to an original phylogenetic analysis, based on a revised matrix of dental, cranio-mandibular and postcranial characters, Ls. maurettei is an early diverging lophiodontid morphologically close to Protomoropus and Paleomoropus, two basal chalicotheres, known from Asia and North America, respectively. Our resulting topology does not support the previously proposed inclusion of the lophiodontids within the Ceratomorpha and supports a position within the suborder Ancylopoda, close to some Eomoropidae representatives. These results imply that Ls. maurettei was restricted to Southern Europe during the early Eocene, which would be compatible with an Asian origin for lophiodontids in accordance with the evolutionary history of other perissodactyls and placental mammals.
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85103187484&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1080/02724634.2020.1878200
DO - 10.1080/02724634.2020.1878200
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85103187484
SN - 0272-4634
VL - 40
JO - Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology
JF - Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology
IS - 6
M1 - e1878200
ER -