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Bull. Soc. belge Géol., Paléont., Hydrol. T. 79 fasc. 2 pp. 167-174 Bruxelles 1970 Bull. Belg. Ver. Geol., Paleont., Hydrol. V. 79 deel 2 blz. 167-174 Brussel 1970 MAMMALS OF THE CRAG AND FOREST BED B. McW1LLIAMs SuMMARY. In the Red and Norwich Crags mastodonts gradually give way to the southern elephant, large caballine horses and deer of the Euctenoceros group become common. Large rodents are represented by Castor, Trogontherium and rarely Hystrix; small forms include species of Mimomys. Carnivores include hyaena, sabre-toothed cat, leopard, polecat, otter, bear, seal and walrus. The Cromer Forest Bed Series had steppe and forest forms of the southern elephant and the mastodont has been lost. Severa! species of giant deer become widespread and among the many rodents are a. number of voles which develop rootless cheek teeth. The mole is common. Warmth indicators include a monkey, and more commonly hippopotamus. Possible indicators of cold include glutton and musk ox. Rhinoceros is widespread, and it is a time of rapid evolution for the elk. Carnivores include hyaena, bear, glutton, polecat, marten, wold and seal. The interpretation of mammalian finds from is represented by bones which resemble the the Crags and Forest Bed is not an easy mole remains but are about twice their size. matter. A proportion of the remains have been derived from eatlier horizons, others are Order Primates discovered loose in modern coastal deposits, and early collectors often kept inadequate The order is represented at this period m records. Owing to the uncertain processes of England by a single record of Macaca sp., the fossilisation or inadequate collecting there are distal end of a teft humerus from a sandy many gaps in our knowledge of the mammal horizon of the Cromerian at West Runton, ian faunas of these times. Norfolk. Most workers feel grave doubts about the alleged Crag date of the human jaw Order Insectivora found at Foxhall near Ipswich, but as the bone bas been lost for more than a century Three shrews have been recorded from the fully conclusive evidence is not available. Cromer Forest Bed Series, one, Sorex savini Hinton, as large as any known fossil or living form, a second, Sorex runtonensis Hinton, Order Carnivora about the size of the modern pygmy shrew, and the third, Neomys newtoni Hinton, similar In the Lower and early Middle Pleistocene of to our modern water shrew and possibly its East Anglia more than twenty species of predecessor. carnivore have been recorded, though now A mole, similar to Talpa europaea L. is here are they common. common in the temperate freshwater beds of The typical Lower Pleistocene hyaena, the Cromerian, and is mainly represented by Hyaena perrieri CROIZET & JOBERT, is found its relatively robust and characteristically in the Crags, and a much larger species, shaped humerus, though other bones and Hyaena brevirostris Aymard, is typical of the mandibles are known. The European desman, early Forest Bed where it is soon replaced by Desmana moschata Pallas, now restricted to the spotted hyaena, Crocuta crocuta Erxleben. south-east Russia and central western Asia, There were two sabre-toothed cats; a larger 167 species of Crag date, Homotherium sainzelli The boundaries between these species in the Aymard, recorded as far north as Derbyshire Forest Bed are rather blurred. in a cave deposit, and a smaller species, Seal fossils occur throughout the Crags and Homotherium latidens Owen, known in the Forest Bed but in the absence of cranial Cromerian by a few fine canines. A single cat remains little can be said of their specific tooth from the same horizon resembles Felis identity. When limb-bones are compared with lunensis Martelli rather than the modern wild modern North Sea forms they show no cat, and a leopard, Felis pardoides Owen, has recognisable differences. A few walrus tusks been recorded from the Red and Norwich and bones described under the name Triche Crag. The lion, Felis leo L., first reached this chus huxleyi LANKES!ER have been found in country in the Forest Bed as a spectacularly both Crags and Forest Bed but three mineral large form. ised crania dredged off the Norfolk coast are Severa! mustelids are known from East presumably more recent. Anglian deposits but they are rather rare. A glutton, probably Gulo schlosseri Kormos, Order Proboscidea rather than Gulo gulo L., has been found in Forest Bed strata; unlike the latter species its The central element of the Crag and Forest presence may not indicate cold conditions. Bed fauna are the mastcidonts and elephants, The probable ancestor of the pine marten which were widely distributed and show occurs in the Forest Bed as Martes vetus evolutionary trends in the structure of their Kretzoi, with a large polecat, Pannoniotis teeth which can be matched with environ pliocaenica Kormos, first found in a late mental changes which characterise the Pleisto Pliocene forest fauna in Hungary. A second cene itself. polecat, Enhydrictis ardea Bravard, has been Two mastodonts survived from the Pliocene recorded from the Red Crag, but polecats of in Europe, but one, Zygolophodon borsoni modern type are first found in the Forest Bed, HAYS, died out early in the Pleistocene and is possibly Mustela putorius L. itself. Remains only represented in the Red Crag by a few of the weasel, or possibly its predecessor very worn molars in the basement bed which Mustela praenivalis Kormos have also been are obivously derived. The second mastodont, found, and in the Norwich Crag there occurs Anancus arvernensis CROIZET & JOBERT, was an otter, Aonyx resvei Newton. the characteristic proboscidean of the early Wolf, Canis lupus L., is undoubtedly present Pleistocene and occurs in both the Red and in the Forest Bed, but earlier records, and Norwich Crags but by the end of the Lower those of a fox from this period of the Crags Pleistocene was extinct in this country and the are rather uncertain. southern elephant, Archidiskodon meridionalis An unusual mammal recorded from three NESTI was common. Molars of the southern localities of the Red Crag is a panda, Parai elephant are found in the Red and Norwich /urus anglicus BoYD DA WKINS, evidently Crags, and in the latter are as numerous as closely related to the modern lesser panda those of the mastodont. Limb bones and which is now restricted to bamboo ·forests on vertebrae become better represented in the the slopes of the Himalayas. younger Crag sands and by Forest Bed times Although bear remains, probably Ursus are abundant at several localities. It is at this arvernensis CROIZET & JOBERT, are· known period that the species begins to show a from two Red Crag localities it is not until division into presumed forest and steppe forms Forest Bed times that representatives of this which diverge into the temperate straight family become relatively common. The fossils tusked elephant, Palaeoloxodon antiquus FAL can be separated into two species, Ursus CONER & CAUTLEY, and the steppe mammoth, deningeri REICHENAU, and Ursus savini AN Mammuthus trogontherii PoHLIG. The southern DREWS, with the possibility of a third species, elephant ranged through Europe as far as the Ursus spelaeus ROSENMULLER & HEINROTH. Black Sea and North Africa and is <listing- 168 guished by its large, gently-curving tusks, wide systematics of this family are rather confused. molars with short, broad grinding surfaces Rolled teeth of Hipparion cf. gracile KAUP enclosing relatively few widely spaced lamel occur in the Red Crag, obviously derived lae. The adults reached a shoulder height of from an older horizon. over 12 ft. and have correspondingly massive limb bones. Order Artiodactyla The forest form of the southern elephant appears to have become a distinct species by Pig fossils from the Red Crag are scarce and Forest Bed times. Palaeoloxodon antiquus may belong to Sus strozzii MENEGHINI. The FALCONER & CAUTLEY has rather narrow deep first satisfactory remains corne from the Forest molars, the lamellae in the grinding surface of Bed of Norfolk. These include a fine skull and the lower molars in particular tend towards mandible from one individual which appears a lozenge-shaped pattern of wear with rela to be a large form of the modern wild hog, tively thick, coarsely folded enamel. The tusks Sus scrofa L. are large and gently curved. The hippopotamus which reached this Forms transitional between the southern country by Forest Bed times has often been elephant and the steppe mammoth, Mam thought of as a separate species from the muthus trogontherii PoHLIG, are first found in modern Hippopotamus amphibius L., but the the Forest Bed. Molars of this species have a only difference is in size, the early form being relatively large number of lamellae which tend rather larger than the modern animal. Hippo towards a division into three parts in the potamus is absent until the last interglacial, posterior part of the grinding surface. At its the lpswichian, where it occurs in some acme this species attained a shoulder height abundance. of over 14 feet and later in the Pleistocene gave Deer remains form an important part of rise to the woolly mammoth, Mammuthus the fauna of the Crags and Forest Bed but are primigenius BOJANUS. a difficult family to work on as most identifi cations are based on the antlers. Other parts Order Perissodactyla of the skeleton are grouped with antlers mainly on size because associated bones are rare. A number of tapir teeth described under the Where similar sized deer occur together the species Tapirus arvernensis CROIZET & JOBERT problems are formidable. have been found in the nodule bed of the Four species of the genus Euctenoceros have Red Crag, these may have been derived from been separated on the basis of the forms of the a Pliocene source.

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