Monte Peglia

Monte Peglia

As Monte Peglia Italian is Umbria an archaeological site of the Lower Palaeolithic known to the few artifacts have been excavated, however, numerous remains of mammals . These were found near the highest point of the 837 m high mountain that gave it its name, which is more of a relatively flat ridge. The mountain belongs to a mountain range that separates the area around Orvieto from the Tiber valley. Two choppers and four flint artifacts were discovered, but no longer in a stratigraphic position and therefore only roughly datable to the Middle Pleistocene . In any case, these artifacts represent the oldest traces of humans in Umbria, and they are possibly among the oldest in Italy. The site was discovered by the collectors R. Spinola and P. Favella, and several excavation campaigns followed in 1955, 1957, 1964 to 1966 and 1968.

Saber-toothed cat skull ( Homotherium crenatidens fabrini )

In July and August 1955, remains of small mammals were discovered during the excavation under the direction of Alberto Carlo Blanc from the Istituto di Paleontologia Umana in Rome, as well as some bones, horns and teeth from larger mammals at a separate site nearby. During the second excavation from 1963 under the direction of Gustav Heinrich Ralph von Koenigswald from the University of Utrecht , the lion's share of the small mammals was collected. Therefore, the collection is now divided into two parts, one part is in Rome, one part in Utrecht.

Remnant of a rodent species, Florence Paleological Museum

In two places near the summit of Monte Peglia, two deposits of mammalian remains ("terre rosse") were discovered, which were assigned to around the same time, but the site, which mostly housed large mammals, was associated with a subtropical era, the other Site, consisting mainly of small mammals, a rather cooler one.

To the small mammal finds one hand remains part of the extinct rodent species Mimomys blanci and the vole Microtus (Allophaiomys) nutiensis as Talpa fossilis Petényi from the genus Eurasian moles , Sorex runtonensis Hinton of the genus Sorex or Asoriculus castellarini (Pasa) from the shrew subfamily Soricinae . But even larger mammals could be identified as Macaca sylvana Linnaeus (a Berberaffenart ) Homotherium crenatidens Fabrini (a saber-toothed cat, according to other sources is Homotherium latidens (Owen) ), the Wolf species Canis etruscus and arnensis , finally Leptobos , a Rinderart which preceded the origin bison also different types of holds, dormouse , this mouse species such Pliomys episcopalis Mèheley , Mimomys savini Hinton , Mimomys blanci Meulen , wood mice or rabbit dwelling Lepus terraerubrae Kretzoi . The second collection, which was found in the clay and breccia above the calcite layer, is characterized by a high proportion of Microtus (A.) burgondiae , but Sorex runtonensis , a species of the red- toothed shrew or Ungaromys nanus , could also be detected, but also Apodemus maastrichtiensis .

In 2003 Claudia Bedetti added a list of avifauna, which includes a new type of Hawk eagle , then an eagle, an unspecified type of hawk-like , Falco antiquus (a type of falcon ), then quail , partridge , Columba livia minuta ( rock dove ), finally the raven species Corvus pliocaenus . The fossils are stored in the Istituto Italiano di Paleontologia Umana in Anagni .

literature

• Giorgio Basilici, Adria Giulia Faraone, Sergio Gentili: Un nuovo reperto di Macaca nelle brecce ossifere pleistoceniche di Monte Peglia (Terni, Italia Centrale) , in: Bollettino della Società Paleontologica Italiana 30 (1992) 251-254.
• Marcello Piperno , Aldo G. Segre, Eugenia Segre Naldini: Monte Peglia (Umbria) , in: I primi Abitanti d'Europa , 1985, 115-119.
• Albert Jan van der Meulen: Middle Pleistocene smaller mammals from the Monte Peglia, (Orvieto, Italy) with special reference to the phylogeny of Microtus (Arvicolidae, Rodentia) , in: Quaternaria 17 (1973) 1-143.
• Alberto Carlo Blanc: Breccia ossifera villafranchiana a Monte Peglia (Orvieto) , in: Quaternaria 2 (1955) 314-317.

Remarks

1. ↑ Marcello Piperno : The Monte Peglia lithic industry , in: Quaternaria 16 (1972) 53-65.
2. ↑ Raffaele Sardella, David Allen Iurmo: The latest Early Pleistocene sabertoothed cat Homotherium (Felidae, Mammalia) from Monte Peglia (Umbria, central Italy) , in: Bollettino della Società Paleontologica Italiana 51.1 (2012) 15–22 ( online , PDF ).
3. ↑ Patrizia Argenti: Plio-quaternary mammal fossiliferous sites of Umbria (Central Italy) , in: Geologica Romana 37 (2003-2004) 67-78, here: p. 77 ( online ( Memento of the original of September 18, 2016 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this note. , PDF). 
4. ↑ Claudia Bedetti: Le avifaune fossili del Plio-Pleistocene italiano: Sistematica, paleoecologia ed elementi di biocronologia . Diss., Università “La Sapienza”, Rome 2003.

Coordinates: 42 ° 49 ′ 5.1 ″  N , 12 ° 12 ′ 34.5 ″  E