Sus strozzii (Suidae, Mammalia) from the historical locality of Quercia (Early Pleistocene, Italy)

The Occurrence of Suids in the Post-Olduvai to Pre-Jaramillo Pleistocene of Europe and Implications for Late Villafranchian Biochronology and Faunal Dynamics

“…The only site of this period for which detailed information on NISP and MNI is available is Poggio Rosso (Upper Valdarno), where suid remains account for a mere 4% of the total [49]. Despite this percentage being quite modest, the abundance of suid remains in the rest of the Early Pleistocene is even lower (Figure 7)-and, for completeness, it is worth mentioning that the situation does not change substantially in the early Middle Pleistocene, when S. scrofa is present [13,92].…”

“…Comparing the Peyrolles MT IV with the homologous element in S. scrofa reveals a clear morphological resemblance, but I assign it to Sus sp., considering the limited knowledge on the postcranial anatomy of S. strozzii and the poor preservation of our specimen. In detail, I could not find an isolated and well-preserved MT IV of S. strozzii among the main collections that preserve remains of the species (see the institutions listed by Iannucci [13,68]). The MT IV is present in a mounted subadult skeleton from Senèze preserved in the Naturhistorisches Museum Basel (NMB) [69], which is the main source of information on the postcranial anatomy of S. strozzii and associated paleoecological inference [70].…”

“…Remains assigned to S. strozzii are already known from some localities older than 2 Ma, but none of them include more than a handful of specimens [13]-though Senèze yielded an almost complete skeleton [70]. To the list of early occurrences of S. strozzii discussed by Iannucci [13] (Saint Vallier, Valdeganga II, Coste San Giacomo, Quercia, and Vigna Nuova) should be added Pantalla, which has recently been recognized as older than previously assumed, at ~2.2 Ma [91]. Even in the case of Pantalla, S. strozzii is represented only by a hemimandible [31].…”

“…Even in the case of Pantalla, S. strozzii is represented only by a hemimandible [31]. The time span bracketed between 2 and 1.8 Ma can be considered the acme of abundance of S. strozzii, with several localities correlated with the Olivola and Tasso FUs documenting the presence of the species, especially in central Italy [13,31,68,70] (Figure 8A). The only site of this period for which detailed information on NISP and MNI is available is Poggio Rosso (Upper Valdarno), where suid remains account for a mere 4% of the total [49].…”

“…The perceived biochronological and paleoecological significance of the Early Pleistocene suids of Europe in the context of Quaternary faunal turnovers and in relation to hominins has long been quite low, being mainly limited to the inclusion of the appearance of S. strozzii in the bioevents denoting the late Villafranchian faunal turnover, the "Wolf event" [10][11][12]-although the species is now documented in several middle Villafranchian localities [13]-and to the emphasis placed on the replacement between S. strozzii Forsyth Major, 1881 [14] and S. scrofa Linnaeus, 1758 [15] in terms of the different ecological requirements of the two species [16,17]. In this framework, an important impetus was given by the work of Martínez-Navarro et al [18], in which it is argued that suids were absent from Europe during the 1.8-1.2 Ma time span and that a species phylogenetically related to the extant wild boar (Sus gr.…”