Notes on Asian stegodontids

Abstract

Stegodontids, elephant-like proboscideans, flourished in the Neogene and Quaternary of Asia. The most significant recent finding in the study of stegodontids is the new stegodons and stegolophodons fossils from Nakhon Ratchasima, Thailand and Yuanmou Basin, Yunnan. Those specimens show a transition from stegolophodons to stegodons and support the idea that stegodons originated in Asia. Evolution of island forms from the mainland ancestral one is best documented in the Japanese islands. The following succession is present in Japan: S. zdanskyi, S. miensis, an intermediate form between S. iensis and S. aurorae, S. aurorae, and S. orientalis. The former three taxa represent a single lineage. The succession from S. zdanskyi to S. miensis may have been present also in the coastal area of China. © 2004 Elsevier Ltd and INQUA. All rights reserved.