Dr. Murai Éva szerk.: Parasitologia Hungarica 13. (Budapest, 1980)
JAEGER, LOPEZ-MARTINEZ, MICHAUX and THALER (1977) has demonstrate the possibility of faunal exchanges between Europe and North Africa through Gibraltar during the Late Neogene (Miocene and Pliocene). MAS-COMA (1978) shows how Gerbillid hosts following the Betic-Rifenian-Moghrebinian archway had introduced some African helminths into Europe. Nevertheless, on the one hand Gerbillids are not usual hosts of S . lobata and have disappeared today from EuFope. On the other hand, in the case that S . lobata had entered the Iberian Peninsula from the south through Gibraltar, its posterior expansion throughout Europe could not take place, since Iberian living Murids and Microtias are immigrants coming from Europe. Summing up, the most reasonable is to accept a proximal Asiatic origin for the .S krja binotaenia forms, the most primitive of which, S . lobata , having started from this Near East into Europe and North Africa with Apodemus and into the Ethiopian Region with other Muroidea. Subsequent introduction of primitive Skrjabinotaenia forms into the Ethiopian Region has to be continued following a gradual shortening of strobila and differentiation of species in hosts of the families GerbiUidae, Muridae, Dendromuridae and Cricetidae. The extreme case in this evolutionary line is S . pauciproglottis, evidently the shorter and youngest living form. Further differentiation inside the subfamily Skrjabinotaeniinae occurred in the Ethiopian Region. There arise another line of forms (genus Meggittina), tending to shorten and dividing longitudinally the last gravid segments of the strobila. These cestodes Skrjabinotaeniinae are now known as parasites of African rodents of the families Cricetidae, Gerbillidae and Muridae. As noted by QUENTIN (1971), already in some species of Skrjabinotaenia, such as S. psammomi and S. oranensis , it is possible to detect some signs in the last gravid segments indicating in the way of almost>«intermediate forms, near to the Meggittina morphology. Taking into account that both last species are parasites of Gerbillidae in North Africa, QUENTIN (1971) suggest that the starting point of the Meggittina line should be in North-African Gerbillidae (the oldest Gerbillidae fossils had been found in the Late Pliocene THENIUS, 1972), to expand to the rest of the African continent later, adapting secondarily to other families of rodents. The existence of Skrjabinotaenia madagascariensis and Meggittina baeri in Brachyuromys betsileoensis and B. ramirohitra (CricetidaerNesomyinae) in Madagascar give evidence that both evolutionary lines of Skrjabinotaeniinae had further spread from Africa into the Malgachian Region. As pointed out by THENIUS (1972: 180), the scarce paleontological data about Nesomyinae from the Pleistocene are not sufficient as to determine the appearance of these rodents in the island. Nevertheless, they are perhaps only "migrators" in the Late Tertiary. THENIUS (1972: 66) writes concretely: "Nesomyinae vielleicht erst im Jungtertiär eingewandert". If we accept the origin of Skrjabinotaeniinae cestodes in the Late Tertiary (Miocene), as suggested before, there had been enough time in the Late Neogene to expand throughout Africa, including Madagascar. Thus, it is not necessary to assume that the hosts of these two Malgachian cestodes were rodents which do not live anymore in Madagascar due to competition (see QUENTIN and DURETTE-DESSET, 1974: 110). CHABAUD and BRYGOO (1964), basing on MILLOT (19 52), accept also the possibility of fortuitous introductions of helminths of recent evolution through accidental transports of hosts from the African continent into the Madagascar island. REFERENCES AKHUMYAN, K. S. (1946): K prestrojke cestod roda Catenotaenia Janicki, 1904. - Gelmint. sbor. 40-let. Deiatelnost. Skrjabin, 37-41. ARANDAS, REGO, A. (1967): Sobre alguns cestodeos parasitos de Roederos do Brasil (Cestoda, Cyclophyllidea). - Mem. Inst. Oswaldo Cruz, 6i5. 1-18. BIENEK, G.K. - GRUNDMANN, A.W. (1947) : Catenotaenia utahensis sp. n. (Cestoda: Catenotaeniidae) from the merriam kangaroo rat, Dipodomys merriami vulcani. - Utah. Proc. Helmin't. Soc. Wash., 41. 134-139.
