摘要
剑齿象化石常见于华南和东南亚众多的古人类遗址中,是更新世亚洲哺乳动物群中最重要的成员之一,但对其进行埋藏学方面的研究则是比较少见的.重庆市巫山县玉米洞遗址出土了148件东方剑齿象化石,占遗址可鉴定标本数的18.5%,是研究其死亡和埋藏动因的良好素材.通过对每一件标本的形态学观察和死亡年龄的分析显示,其中婴、幼年个体占比超过85%,体现了针对幼年个体的选择性死亡模式;从骨骼单元分布来看,头部和足部骨骼占绝对多数,则体现了对剑齿象尸体部位的选择性搬运.虽然不能确定主动捕猎或食腐行为,但玉米洞遗址剑齿象化石的埋藏过程显示出非常清晰的古人类行为迹象.从中更新世晚期至晚更新世,玉米洞遗址的古人类对婴、幼年剑齿象均有特殊的偏好,可能与成年剑齿象不易捕猎亦或是幼象的肉更适合食用有关,或者两种原因兼而有之.
Stegodont fossils have been recovered from many paleoanthropological sites in South China and Southeast Asia, marking them as one of the most important constituents in Pleistocene mammalian faunas of Asia. Yet very limited taphonomic research has been conducted so far concerning the context of their present in paleoanthropological sites. Recently, a large number of stegodont fossils have been found at the Yumidong Cave site in Wushan County, Chongqing Municipality,providing us with opportunities not only for morphological observation, but also taphonomic analysis.The studied materials include 94 cranial remains(jaws and teeth) and 54 remains of the postcrania from both the upper and lower cultural layers at Yumidong, which make up about 18.5% of the total identified specimens. Morphologically, the ridge-crest formulae, the number of mammillae and the measurements of most these specimens conform to Stegodon orientalis. Taphonomically, traces of natural activities, such as water transportation and bite marks of animals, are very few on the surface of these Stegodon remains;meanwhile, these fossils are unearthed associated with paleolithic tools in the Yumidong Cave site, among which at least three bone tools are made of incisors of Stegodon orientalis. These observations indicate that ancient human activity was the dominant cause in the accumulation of this Stegodon fossil assemblage.Due to the peculiarity of tooth replacement and attrition of these proboscideans, we are able to attribute most of each individual specimen, except two fragments of M2/3, as belonging to a distinct individual animal. The analysis of mortality age profiles shows that neonate and juvenile individuals account for more than 85% among the Stegodon fossils, indicating a type of selective mortality of immature individuals. In the schematic typology of living and extinct proboscidean age profiles, the type B of Haynes is dominated by the youngest age group which may result from hunting either by carnivores or humans.The skeletal element profil
作者
陈少坤
庞丽波
吴雁
胡鑫
Shaokun Chen;Libo Pang;Yan Wu;Xin Hu(Three Gorges Institute of Paleoanthropology,China Three Gorges Museum,Chongqing 400015,China;State Key Laboratory of Palaeobiology and Stratigraphy,Nanjing Institute of Geology and Palaeontology,Chinese Academy of Sciences,Nanjing 210008,China)
出处
《科学通报》
EI
CAS
CSCD
北大核心
2021年第12期1482-1491,共10页
Chinese Science Bulletin
基金
国家自然科学基金(41430102)
中国科学院前沿科学重点研究项目(QYZDY-SSW-DQC022)
中国科学院战略性先导科技专项(XDB26030302)
现代古生物学和地层学国家重点实验室开放课题(173102)资助。
