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The New Subspecies of the European Water Buffalo (Artiodactyla, Bovidae) from the Upper Pleistocene of the Russian Plain

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Abstract

A new subspecies of the fossil European water buffalo, Bubalus murrensis extremus, is described from an almost complete skull found in the Upper Pleistocene deposits of the Lukerino village near the city of Kolomna (Moscow Region). The fossil is dated to the Allerød interstadial (12.8 cal. kyr). Until now, the species was only known from the Middle and early Late Pleistocene of Europe. New data allow us to clarify the diagnosis and occurrence of the species.

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ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

The authors thank the employees of the Kolomna Regional Museum for the opportunity to study the skull of the buffalo from Lukerino and to E.P. Zazovskaya for help in determining its absolute age, Prof. W. von Koenigswald, Dr. R. Ziegler and Dr. M. Aiglstorfer for sending us some papers and photos as well as Prof. A. Lister for his comments on this discovery. Radiocarbon dating of the specimens was done by the Laboratory of Radiocarbon Dating and Electron Microscopy of the Institute of Geography of the Russian Academy of Sciences and the Center for Applied Isotope Research, University of Georgia (Athens, USA).

Funding

The work was partly supported by the Basic Research Program of the Presidium of the Russian Academy of Sciences “The Evolution of the Organic World: The Role and Influence of Planetary Processes” and also by the Russian Science Foundation (project no. 18-74-10081, “The Evolution of Vertebrate Communities in the Late Cenozoic of Eastern Europe”).

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  1. Borissiak Paleontological Institute, Russian Academy of Sciences, 117647, Moscow, Russia

    I. A. Vislobokova, K. K. Tarasenko & A. V. Lopatin

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  1. I. A. Vislobokova
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  2. K. K. Tarasenko
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  3. A. V. Lopatin
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Correspondence to I. A. Vislobokova.

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Translated by D. Ponomarenko

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Vislobokova, I.A., Tarasenko, K.K. & Lopatin, A.V. The New Subspecies of the European Water Buffalo (Artiodactyla, Bovidae) from the Upper Pleistocene of the Russian Plain. Paleontol. J. 54, 662–670 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1134/S0031030120060118

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