During the last ZO years great progress has been achieved in our understanding of both earth history and vertebrate evolution. The result is that climatic/tectonic events in earth history can now be placed in a more precise and global time frame, that permit their evaluation as abiotic causal factors which might trigger extinction and dispersal events in vertebrate history. Great strides have also been made in genetics and cell biology, providing new insight into phylogenetic relationships among many vertebrates. These new data, along with data on chronologie resolution of earth history, provide tests of previous interpretations regarding ancestral-descendant relationships based solely on the fossil record. It is fitting and proper that a volume on European Neogene mammal chronology is produced at this time, to ensure that new interpretations of vertebrate evolution and chronology are based on the most accurate and current data. Vertebrate paleon­ tologists believe that the fossil record is the only secure data for measuring the actual course and tempo of vertebrate evolution. Knowledge of the fossil record must keep pace with advances in other areas of science so that inferences on vertebrate evolu­ tion are accurate and meaningful.

Inhalt

Aspects of European Mammal Chronology.- The Setting.- European Neogene Marine/Continental Chronologic Correlations.- A Biochronologic Subdivision of the European Paleogene Based on Mammals - Report on Results of the Paleogene Symposium held in Mainz in February 1987.- The Ramblian and Aragonian: Limits, Subdivision, Geographical and Temporal Extension.- New Neogene Rodent Assemblages from Anatolia (Turkey).- Updating of MN Zones.- Muroid Rodent Biochronology of the Neogene and Quaternary in Europe.- Biozones or Mammal Units? Methods and Limits in Biochronology.- Large Mammal Dispersal Events at the Beginning of the Late Villafranchian.- Regional Papers.- Synthesis on the "Aquitanian" Lagomorph and Rodent Faunas of the Aquitaine Basin (France).- The Faunas and Stratigraphical Subdivisions of the Orleanian in the Loire Basin (France).- A Preliminary Mammal Zonation of the Upper Marine Molasse of Switzerland.- The Faunal Succession in the Bavarian Molasse Reconsidered-Correlation of the MN5 and MN6 Faunas.- Stratigraphy of Neogene Mammals of Poland.- The Neogene VP Sites of Czechoslovakia: A Contribution to the Neogene Terrestric Biostratigraphy of Europe Based on Rodents.- Faunal Datum Papers.- The "Proboscidean Datum Event:" How Many Proboscideans and How Many Events?.- The Proboscideans Data, Age, and Paleogeography: Evidence from the Miocene of Lisbon.- Patterns of Old World Hipparionine Evolutionary Diversification and Biogeographic Extension.- The Hipparions of the Lower Axios Valley (Macedonia, Greece). Implications for the Neogene Stratigraphy and the Evolution of Hipparions.- The Genus Equus in Europe.- Biogeographic Synthesis.- Bioevents and Mammal Successions in the Spanish Miocene.- The Miocene Rodent Succession in Eastern Spain: A Zoogeographical Appraisal.- Gundersheim-Findling, a Ruscinian Rodent Fauna of Asian Affinities from Germany.- Dynamics of Old World Biogeographic Realms during the Neogene: Implications for Biostratigraphy.- Paleoecological Synthesis.- Miocene Paleoecology of Pasalar, Turkey.- Taphonomic and Sedimentary Factors in the Fossil Record of Mammals.- Relations Between Paleoclimatology and Plio-Pleistocene Biostratigraphic Data in West European Countries.- Small Mammal Taphonomy.- Magnetostratigraphic Applications.- Hipparion Datum and its Chronologic Evidence in the Mediterranean Area.- The Magnetic Stratigraphy of the Late Miocene Sediments of the Cabriel Basin, Spain.- Preliminary Magnetostratigraphic Results of Some Neogene Mammal Localities from Anatolia (Turkey).- Sequences Outside Europe.- The Chinese Neogene Mammalian Biochronology - Its Correlation with the European Neogene Mammalian Zonation.- Key Biostratigraphic Events in the Siwalik Sequence.- Quo Vadis, Antemus? The Siwalik Muroid Record.- The African Dimension in European Early Miocene Mammal Faunas.- Development and Application of Land Mammal Ages in North America and Europe, A Comparison.- New Perspectives.- The Past, the Present, and the Future.- Contributors.- Taxonomic Index (Mammal Genera).