ABSTRACT
Five rhinoceros species, mainly distinguishable through cranial, mandibular and dental morphology, were recognized during the Quaternary across Europe. The postcranial morphology of these taxa is quite variable, with strong superposition among species, especially between Stephanorhinus etruscus and Stephanorhinus hundsheimensis. Here, the complete sample including 25 postcranial bones from the early Middle Pleistocene site of Contrada Monticelli (Apulia, southern Italy) is described and compared through morphological and biometric analyses. A few bones, in addition to cranial and mandibular remains from this site, have been previously referred to Stephanorhinus hundsheimensis. We explored the morphological variability of Stephanorhinus hundsheimensis from Contrada Monticelli against the diagnostic characters described in the literature. The size variation of the Contrada Monticelli sample is also investigated, through a comparison with other Quaternary European rhinoceros samples. Our results indicate a wide morphological variability with several distinct characters and a strong morphological affinity between Stephanorhinus etruscus and S. hundsheimensis. Our results suggest that Stephanorhinus hundsheimensis from Contrada Monticelli is a species with a high degree of intraspecific variability, possibly a hybrid population or a population including two morphotypes of the same species.
Author contributions
Conceptualization: Marzia Breda, Beniamino Mecozzi, Dario Stefanelli
Data curation: Beniamino Mecozzi, Dario Stefanelli
Formal analysis: Dario Stefanelli
acquisition: Maria Marino, Beniamino Mecozzi, Raffaele Sardella
Investigation: Beniamino Mecozzi, Dario Stefanelli
Methodology: Marzia Breda, Beniamino Mecozzi, Dario Stefanelli
Supervision: Marzia Breda, Maria Marino, Raffaele Sardella
Visualization: Dario Stefanelli
Writing – original draft: Marzia Breda, Beniamino Mecozzi, Dario Stefanelli
Writing – review & editing: Marzia Breda, Maria Marino, Beniamino Mecozzi, Raffaele Sardella, Dario Stefanelli
Acknowledgments
The authors thank Panagiotis Kampouridis and the other two anonymous reviewers for their insightful and useful comments and suggestions which greatly improved the manuscript. DS is grateful to the Museo di Scienze della Terra and Dipartimento di Scienze della Terra e Geoambinetali (University of Bari Aldo Moro, Italy) for the facilitation to access the Museum and to study the fossil sample from Contrada Monticelli. DS thanks Ursula Göhlich, Curator of Vertebrate Paleontology at the Natural History Museum of Vienna for the access to the holotype fossil of Stephanorhinus hundsheimensis.
BM thanks Linda Riti and Michele Macrì for the access to the fossils from Vitinia stored at University Museum of Earth Science, Sapienza University of Rome (Rome, central Italy) and Maria Carmela Del Re for the access to the sample from Melpignano, stored at the Museum of Paleontology of the University of Naples Federico II.
BM and DS thanks Gabriella Margiotta and Enrica Maria Muci for the access to the fossils from Cardamone kept at the State Institute of Higher Education “Galilei-Costa-Scarambone” (Lecce, southern Italy).
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).
Supplementary material
Supplemental data for this article can be accessed online at https://doi.org/10.1080/08912963.2024.2328276.