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| Solitudo sicula Valenti, Vlachos, Kehlmaier, Fritz, Georgalis, Luján, Miccichè, Sineo & Delfino, 2022 |
Abstract
Archaeological investigations carried out in the cave Zubbio di Cozzo San Pietro, Bagheria, Sicily, revealed the presence of a few skeletal elements of a large-sized tortoise in a funerary area dating to the Copper/Bronze Age. The tortoise has been AMS-dated revealing an age of 12.5 ± 0.5 kyr BP and therefore it pre-dates the funerary activities. The morphology of the retrieved skeletal elements differs from that of the only native tortoise currently living in Sicily, Testudo hermanni. The tortoise’s size significantly exceeds the size range of extant Te. hermanni and all Testudo spp., as well as that of their known fossils, and suggests a shell length of 50–60 cm. Repeated efforts to obtain DNA sequences from the tortoise of Zubbio di Cozzo San Pietro failed, but the morphology of the femur is distinct enough to allow us to erect a new taxon, Solitudo sicula gen. et sp. nov., based on a parsimony analysis. It belongs to a hitherto unrecognized clade that includes other large-sized tortoises from Mediterranean islands, like Malta and Menorca. A review of the pertinent taxa indicates that the remains here described represent the geologically youngest large-sized tortoise of the Mediterranean area.
ancient DNA, insular faunas, Italy, latest Late Pleistocene, parsimony, Sicily, Testudinidae
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| Comparison of the femur of Sicilian giant tortoise Solitudo sicula and Hermann’s tortoise Testudo hermanni. Photo: Petro Valenti. |
Solitudo sicula gen. et sp. nov.
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| Hermann’s tortoise Testudo hermanni (shell) and half-grown Galapagos giant tortoise ∼ equivalent to the size of Sicilian giant tortoise Solitudo sicula The newly discovered Sicilian giant tortoise had a carapace length of up to 60 cm and was significantly larger than the Hermann’s tortoise still found in Sicily today. This is approximately equivalent to the size difference between the shown Hermann’s tortoise and the half-grown Galapagos giant tortoise. Photo: Uwe Fritz |
Pietro Valenti, Evangelos Vlachos, Christian Kehlmaier, Uwe Fritz, Georgios L Georgalis, Àngel Hernández Luján, Roberto Miccichè, Luca Sineo and Massimo Delfino. 2022. The Last of the Large-sized Tortoises of the Mediterranean Islands. Zoological Journal of the Linnean Society. zlac044. DOI: 10.1093/zoolinnean/zlac044
Europe’s Most Recent Fossil Giant Tortoise Discovered
Scientists date bones of an extinct giant tortoise found in Sicily to 12,500 years ago
