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Palaeoloxodon Antiquus) and Other Large Mammals from the Middle Pleistocene Butchering Locality Marathousa 1 (Megalopolis Basin, Greece): Preliminary Results

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Palaeoloxodon Antiquus) and Other Large Mammals from the Middle Pleistocene Butchering Locality Marathousa 1 (Megalopolis Basin, Greece): Preliminary Results Quaternary International xxx (2017) 1e20 Contents lists available at ScienceDirect Quaternary International journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/quaint The skeleton of a straight-tusked elephant (Palaeoloxodon antiquus) and other large mammals from the Middle Pleistocene butchering locality Marathousa 1 (Megalopolis Basin, Greece): preliminary results * George E. Konidaris a, , Athanassios Athanassiou b, Vangelis Tourloukis a, Nicholas Thompson a, Domenico Giusti a, Eleni Panagopoulou b, Katerina Harvati a a Eberhard Karls University of Tübingen, Palaeoanthropology, Senckenberg Centre for Human Evolution and Palaeoenvironment, Rümelinstr. 23, 72070 Tübingen, Germany b Ministry of Culture, Ephorate of Palaeoanthropology-Speleology, Ardittou 34B, 11636 Athens, Greece article info abstract Article history: In this article, we present the first results on the large mammal fauna from the new open-air Lower Received 12 July 2017 Palaeolithic locality Marathousa 1 (MAR-1) (Megalopolis Basin, Peloponnesus, Greece). MAR-1 belongs to Received in revised form the Marathousa Member of the Choremi Formation and its large mammal faunal list (collection 2013 14 November 2017 e2016) includes the castorid Castor fiber, the mustelids Mustela sp. and Lutra simplicidens, the felid Felis Accepted 1 December 2017 sp., the canids Vulpes sp. and Canis sp., the elephantid Palaeoloxodon antiquus, the hippopotamid Available online xxx Hippopotamus antiquus, the bovid Bison sp., and the cervids Dama sp. and Cervus elaphus. This faunal association is common in the Galerian (Middle Pleistocene) mammal communities of Europe (ca. 0.9e0.4 Keywords: Fauna Ma). The MAR-1 fauna is consistent with a temperate climate and is indicative of a landscape with Biochronology substantial woodland components with more open areas, close to permanent and large freshwater Palaeoecology bodies. Of particular interest are an elephant cranium and numerous postcranial elements, which were Taphonomy found in close anatomical association and are attributed to a single individual of the straight-tusked Cut marks elephant Palaeoloxodon antiquus. The skeleton belonged to a male individual in its late adulthood Palaeolithic close to or in its sixties, with live skeletal height around 3.7 m at the shoulder and body mass around 9.0 tonnes. The good state of preservation of the MAR-1 bones allows the identification of taphonomic modifications. Cut marks on the elephant skeleton, and on other elephant and mammal bones, indicate human exploitation by means of butchering activities, in accordance with the traits of the lithic assemblage and its spatial association with the bones. Carnivore activity is also recorded on some elephant and cervid bones. Marathousa 1 is among the oldest elephant butchering sites in Europe and the only one known in Southeastern Europe. © 2017 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/). 1. Introduction lacustrine sediments (Fig. 1a), and is characterized by the presence of economically important lignite seams (Vinken, 1965). Since 1969 The Megalopolis area is an intramontane basin situated in the lignite deposits are mined extensively in open-air quarries and western Arcadia, in the centre of the Peloponnesus (Fig. 1a). used for electricity production. The exposed sections during the Geologically it is a graben, formed in the MesozoicePalaeogene mining operations have offered a unique opportunity to study the basement of the Peloponnesus, and extending along a NWeSE di- stratigraphy and the environment of the Pleistocene palaeolake, rection. The basin is filled with Neogene and Pleistocene fluvial and which once covered the basin. The lacustrine layers preserve most notably remains of vertebrates and plants, mainly mammalian fossils, wood and fruits. Abbreviations: DAP, antero-posterior diameter; D, depth; dp, deciduous lower The mammal fossils of Megalopolis are known since antiquity, premolar; DT, transverse diameter; H, height; L, length; m/M, lower/upper molar; and ‘giant’ bones attributed to mythical beings are reported in p, lower premolar; W, width. ancient Greek writings about the region (see Melentis, 1961; Darlas, * Corresponding author. 2003). The first systematic palaeontological excavations in the E-mail address: [email protected] (G.E. Konidaris). https://doi.org/10.1016/j.quaint.2017.12.001 1040-6182/© 2017 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/). Please cite this article in press as: Konidaris, G.E., et al., The skeleton of a straight-tusked elephant (Palaeoloxodon antiquus) and other large mammals from the Middle Pleistocene butchering locality Marathousa 1 (Megalopolis Basin, Greece): preliminary results, Quaternary International (2017), https://doi.org/10.1016/j.quaint.2017.12.001 2 G.E. Konidaris et al. / Quaternary International xxx (2017) 1e20 Fig. 1. a, Geographic position of the Megalopolis Basin and the Marathousa 1 site (lignite mines expansion taken from www.openstreetmap.org in 2015), and stratigraphic column of the basin [modified from van Vugt (2000) and Panagopoulou et al. (2015)]. The globe was taken from commons.wikimedia.org and the map of Greece from www.shadedrelief. com; b, simplified stratigraphic columns of Area A and Area B showing the stratigraphic units and correlation between the two areas [modified from Karkanas et al. (this issue)]; absolute elevation in m.a.s.l. (meters above sea level). The elephant skeleton from Area A lies at the contact of UA3/UA4 and is covered by UA3; c, distribution map of the elephant remains in Area A, grey zones indicate the 2013e2016 excavated areas. Please cite this article in press as: Konidaris, G.E., et al., The skeleton of a straight-tusked elephant (Palaeoloxodon antiquus) and other large mammals from the Middle Pleistocene butchering locality Marathousa 1 (Megalopolis Basin, Greece): preliminary results, Quaternary International (2017), https://doi.org/10.1016/j.quaint.2017.12.001 G.E. Konidaris et al. / Quaternary International xxx (2017) 1e20 3 Megalopolis Basin took place in several localities in 1902 by Pro- Tourloukis et al., this issue a), micro- and macro-fauna (fishes, fessor T. Skouphos (University of Athens) (Bürchner, 1903; amphibians, reptiles, birds, mammals; see also Doukas et al., this Skouphos, 1905; Melentis, 1961), but unfortunately, as with issue and Michailidis et al., this issue), as well as micro- and several historical collections, the fossils lack precise stratigraphic macro-flora (Field et al., this issue). Area A represents mainly a information. Therefore, this collection, which was studied in detail dense accumulation of elephant bones, belonging to a single indi- by Melentis during the 1960s (Melentis, 1961, 1963a, b, 1965a, b, c, vidual of the straight-tusked elephant Palaeoloxodon antiquus, d, e, 1966), does not represent a single stratified fossil accumulation associated with lithic artefacts and other faunal remains. Area B, and cannot be used for biochronology. Since then, further palae- which lies ca. 60 m to the south of Area A, is generally characterized ontological work in the basin has been conducted, including the by the presence of relatively abundant lithic artefacts in association collection of Pleistocene fossils and a human molar from the Mar- with faunal remains. Lithological and stratigraphic correlations athousa Beds by a team of German geologists in the 1960s between the excavated sequences (Fig. 1b; Karkanas et al., this (Sickenberg, 1975); the study on the magneto- and cyclo- issue), along with spatial patterns (Giusti et al., this issue), stratigraphy of the basin, as well as the micro- and macro- archaeological (Panagopoulou et al., this issue; Tourloukis et al., this vertebrate fauna of the Choremiou section (Marathousa Member), issue a) and palaeontological/zooarchaeological evidence (this conducted by van Vugt and colleagues in the 1990s (van Vugt, study) altogether indicate that the find-bearing units in the two 2000); the palaeontological excavations by the University of Ath- excavation areas are correlated and belong to the same depositional ens (Theodorou, 2014) and the study by Athanassiou and colleagues event. Consequently, notwithstanding the fact that the archaeo- in the Kyparissia mine (Athanassiou et al., this issue). The Pleisto- logical signature of the two excavation Areas may represent cene fossil fauna from Megalopolis is therefore relatively well different episodes and/or human activity areas (Panagopoulou known. However, most of the collections mentioned above do not et al., this issue; Tourloukis et al., this issue a), the palae- represent a single stratified assemblage, which can be used for ontological material is treated here as a single faunal assemblage. secure biochronological and palaeoecological interpretations; The preliminary faunal lists for Area A and Area B are presented in furthermore, none of this material was found in association with Table 1. More information on the locality and the stratigraphy can archaeological remains and therefore it cannot provide information be found in Panagopoulou et al. (this issue), Karkanas et al. (this about early human activities. Here we report on the first such issue) and Tourloukis et al. (this issue b). stratified assemblage associated with palaeolithic cultural remains, The studied material includes all the large mammal specimens recovered
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