The Karpatian (late early Miocene) flora of the Mecsek area

Abstract

A rich macroflora has been collected from Karpatian (late early Miocene) layers of the Mecsek Mts during recent decades. The bulk of the fossil assemblage consists of leaves and also fruits of angiosperms. Among the more than a hundred taxa, several endemic species were described: Leguminocarpum mecsekense Andreánszky, Ailanthus mecsekensis Hably, Nyssa gyoergyi sp. nov., Nyssa gergoei sp. nov., Nyssa sp. 1, Clematis csabae sp. nov., Gordonia sp. and Carpolithes gergoei Hably et Erdei sp. nov. Many taxa were last recorded in the Carpathian Basin, e.g. Cedrelospermum, Ziziphus. Other taxa appeared in this flora, e.g. Quercus kubinyii, Podocarpium podocarpum, Liquidambar europaea and Populus populina, and later became dominant in the middle Miocene (Sarmatian) floras or even in the late Miocene (Pannonian) floras. Four main vegetation types were determined. The most significant types are subxerophytic vegetation showing high diversity, swamp vegetation, riparian vegetation, and a vegetation type growing in habitats with higher rainfall. Thermophilous flora elements are dominant in the assemblage, although “arctotertiary” species also appear. The floristic character of the flora supports the results of an earlier quantitative climate analysis of the Magyaregregy flora, according to which mean annual temperature was 15.6–16.6°C and coldest-month and warmest-month temperatures were 5–6.2°C and 24.7–27.9°C, respectively. Generally the assemblage presented in this paper extends those climatological findings to the late early Miocene.