Vörös A. szerk.: Fragmenta Mineralogica Et Palaentologica 18. 1996. (Budapest, 1996)

FRAGMENTA MINERALOGICA ET PALAEONTOLOGICA 18. BUDAPEST, 1996 p. 91-102 Lower Pleistocene vertebrate faunas from the localities 16 and 17 of Beremend (Southern Hungary) by D. Jánossy JÁNOSSY, D. (1996): Lower Pleistocene vertebrate faunas from the localities 16 and 17 of Beremend (Southern Hungary). - Fragm. Min et Pal., 18: 91-102. Abstract: A summary is given about the fauna of the Locality 16(17) of the great quarry system of Beremend, outstanding in the classical fauna! series of the Villány Mountains. The vertebrate fauna consists of several thousand bones belonging to more than one hundred species. The bird fauna is the richest in the series of the Lower Pleistocene ones of Hungary. The bats, due to their large number of species as individuals, give a whole picture of the environment and age, first time in the Villány Mountains. Other small mammal species make possible an exact stratigraphical evaluation of the fauna (characterized by Mimomys savini together with Allophaiomys pliocaenicus). Last but not least, very complete skeletal remains of large carnivore mammals and ungulates enrich the picture of this colourful vertebrate fauna. INTRODUCTION The Lower Cretaceous dark Requienian limestone of the flat Szőlőhegy (= Vineyard Hill) of Beremend, about 9 km south of Villány (southernmost part of Hungary) has been quarried for more than hundred years. Presently, intensive commercial quarrying is being carried out; karstic hollows, caves and fissures containing bones are opened nearly every year. Already in 1847, Salamon János PETÉNYI together with Ágoston KUBINYI made collections in three different localities in the quarry of that time (Beremend Loc. 1, 2 and 3). PETÉNYI described 8 mammal species, new for science, and his descriptions meet even the correct, modern standards. Beginning with the turn of this century, T. KORMOS, Gy. MÉHELY and later J. NOSZKY collected further paleontological material in different localities in the hill (Loc. 4-5). In the 1970's, D. JÁNOSSY and GY. TOPÁL collected bone material from various (mainly scattered) localities (Loc.B/6-15). Shortly after the discovery of the "Crystal Cave" in the quarry system of Beremend in 1984/85 it turned out that this locality is prominent not only by its dripstone and spheric hollow forms, but also as a vertebrate paleontological locality. In the course of collecting in different parts of red clay from 1985 to 1987 in this locality (No. 16) of Beremend we marked our samples as B/16/1 to B/16/20 (the different numbers do not mean different topography but various collections in different