Fossil lizards and snakes from Ano Metochi – a diverse squamate fauna from the latest Miocene of northern Greece

Abstract

We here describe a new squamate fauna from the late Miocene (Messinian, MN 13) of Ano Metochi, northern Greece. The lizard fauna of Ano Metochi is here shown to be rather diverse, consisting of lacertids, anguids, and potential cordylids, while snakes are also abundant, consisting of scolecophidians, natricines and at least two different colubrines. If our identification is correct, the Ano Metochi cordylids are the first ones identified from Greece and they are also the youngest representatives of this group in Europe. A previously described scincoid from the adjacent locality of Maramena is here tentatively also referred to cordylids, strengthening a long term survival of this group until at least the latest Miocene. The scolecophidian from Ano Metochi cannot be attributed with certainty to either typhlopids or leptotyphlopids, which still inhabit the Mediterranean region. The find nevertheless adds further to the poor fossil record of these snakes. Comparison of the Ano Metochi herpetofauna with that of the adjacent locality of Maramena reveals similarities, but also striking differences among their squamate compositions.

Lizards and snakes from the late Miocene hominoid locality of Ravin de la Pluie (Axios Valley, Greece)

“…If RPl 299 belongs indeed to an anguid, then it should be assigned to Anguinae on the basis of the well forwarded haemapophyses fused to the centrum (MiklasTempfer 2003), taking also into consideration the total absence of the sole other known European anguid clade, Glyptosaurinae, after the late Eocene in the continent (Augé 2005;Rage 2013). Attribution of anguine caudal vertebrae to the species or genus level is not possible (e.g., Č erňanský et al 2017a, b;Georgalis et al 2017a). Nevertheless, and if the anguid identity of the specimen is correct, we here suggest possible affinities with Pseudopus pannonicus (Kormos, 1911), a widespread Mio-Pliocene taxon, characterized among others by its large size (Klembara and Rummel 2018).…”

“…Of these, the ''colubrine'' is not adequately preserved and its exact taxonomic affinities cannot be further elucidated. As such, it is of no relevant significance for biogeographic considerations, but nevertheless adds to the previously poor Miocene record of Greek ''colubrines'', which to date comprises only material from localities within the Serres Basin (Szyndlar 1991a(Szyndlar , 1995Georgalis et al 2017a). Among extant non-natricine colubrids, both colubrines (sensu stricto) and psammophiids [i.e., Malpolon insignitus (Geoffroy-Saint-Hilaire, 1827)] inhabit today the area of the Axios valley.…”

Early Miocene gastropod and ectothermic vertebrate remains from the Lesvos Petrified Forest (Greece)

“…Due to the poor preservation of the only known specimen, comparison with known lacertids from other Greek Miocene localities, i.e. from Maramena (Richter 1995) and Ano Metochi (Georgalis et al 2016b), cannot be made.…”

“…On the basis of this single element, it is impossible to determine the exact taxonomic affinities of this taxon. The morphology of the osteoderm does not seem to pertain to lacertids, and it appears possible that it belongs to Anguidae, a lizard clade that still occurs in Lesvos (Valakos et al 2008) and was also present in the Miocene of Greece (Georgalis et al 2016b). However, the possibility that it pertains to another lizard clade cannot be ruled out.…”

First record of fossil anguines (Squamata; Anguidae) from the Oligocene and Miocene of Turkey

“…In Europe, the fossil history of the Anguinae clade is well documented from the Cenozoic era (Klembara and Rummel 2016 and references therein;Georgalis et al 2016a). Anguis and Pseudopus persist in Europe and Western Asia to the present, but Ophisaurus is now absent from that region and has dispersed during the Cenozoic into North Africa (Blain et al 2013), East Asia and North America (see discussion in Klembara and Rummel 2016;Vasilyan et al 2017).…”