Szabó János szerk.: Fragmenta Mineralogica Et Palaentologica 24-25. 2007. (Budapest, 2007)
FRAGMENTA PALAEONTOLOGICA HUNGARICA 24-25, BUDAPEST, 2007 "Elephants" in the cellar. A revision of the Neogene Proboscidean remains, damaged in the fire of the Hungarian Natural History Museum in 1956 by Mihály GASPARIK Abstract — During the Hungarian revolution in 1956 ten thousands of fossils became destroyed or damaged in the fire of the building of the Hungarian National Museum. All of the inventory books and most of the inventory cards burnt away. Mosdy with the help of SCHLESINGER's monograph from 1922 on the Hungarian "mastodon" record, a revision was started on the damaged remains of Deinotheriidae, Gomphotheriidae and Mammutidae. The material contains 36 specimens of teeth and dental fragments (incisors, molars and premolars), under 32 inventory numbers. The following taxa has been identified: Deinotherium cf. proavum, Gomphotherium angustidens, Gomphotheriidae indet., Ananats arvernensis, "Mastodon" grandincisirus and Mammut borsoni. Keywords — Taxonomy, revision, Neogene, Deinotheriidae, Gomphotheriidae, Mammutidae. GASPARIK, M.: "Elephants" in the cellar. A revision of the Neogene Proboscidean remains, damaged in the fire of the Hungarian Natural History Museum in 1956. — ) : ragmen ta Palaeontologica Hungarica, 24—25: 83-91. Introduction The Department of Geology and Palaeontology of the Hungarian Natural History Museum was housed in the building of the Hungarian National Museum until 2005. During the Hungarian revolution in 1956 the building got several hits by tank artillery shells and was burnt out (together with the Department of Mineralogy and Petrology). In the fire all of the inventory 7 books and most of the inventory cards were destroyed, and hence a new inventorying of the remained part of the collection became necessary. This re-inventorying and the identification were easy in the case of the specimens, where the inventor} 7 cards were not burnt away, but in most cases it was rather difficult or impossible. In 1990, in the cellar of the Department, I found a wooden case full of burnt proboscidean remains. Some of them were described and figured in SCHLESINGER (1922) so I was able to identify these specimens. In the case of the other part of the material, I was able to make only a taxonomic determination, except some teeth where the inventory cards were not totally destroyed and I found reference about them in the literature. Material and methods The smdied material includes 36 remains: tusks, tusk fragments, premolars, complete or fragmentary molars and fragments of upper and lower jaws with molars. The specimens probably represent 6 species; I described 5 of them. In the following, I give the list of the specimens, not in taxonomic arrangement, but in the order of degree of their knowledge. I distinguished four groups of the remains. The first group contains the specimens that had their old cards and were re-inventoried before 1990. All of them have been figured in SCHLESINGER (1922) except one second lower molar of Gomphotherium angustidens. The inventory 7 cards of the second group were destroyed in 1956, but the specimens had been figured in SCHLESINGER (1922), so I was able to identify them. I ranked those specimens into the third group that were identifiable with the help of the remnants of their inventory cards and/or of the literature data. In the case of the specimens in the fourth group, I was unable to find any older data therefore I could only carry out their taxonomic identification. Systematics 1 ST group (specimens were re-inventoried before 1990 on the evidence of their old inventory cards) Family Gomphotheriidae HAY, 1922 Genus Gomphotherium BURMEISTER, 1837 Gomphotherium angustidens (CUVIER, 1817) (Plate II: 3, 4)
