Reevaluation of the unusual bovid skull from Lunnaya Cave, Karabi karst plateau, Crimea (SE Ukraine)

• Дата: 2010
• Автор: Vremir, M.
• Формат: Стаття
• Мова: Russian
• Опубліковано: Український інститут спелеології та карстології НАН та МОН України 2010
• Онлайн доступ: http://dspace.nbuv.gov.ua/handle/123456789/15654
• Назва журналу: Digital Library of Periodicals of National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine
• Цитувати: Reevaluation of the unusual bovid skull from Lunnaya Cave, Karabi karst plateau, Crimea (SE Ukraine) / M. Vremir // Спелеологія і карстологія. — 2010. — № 4. — С. 47-51. — Бібліогр.: 16 назв. — англ.

A partial bovid skull, from the karst deposits of Lunnaya Cave (Karabi karst plateau, Crimea) is re-examined. The subfossil find of unknown age, was retrieved by local cavers from Simferopol, and was allocated to the late Pleistocene Eurasian musk-ox: Ovibos moschatus (Zimmermann, 1780). Most recently, a reexamination of the specimen was possible, and a detailed analysis indicates an appurtenance to the water-buffalo (Bubalus bubalis (Kerr, 1792)), with some morphological disorders caused by Hydrocephalus, an inherited malformation sporadically recorded in extant bovids. However the skull was reported from below a thick flowstone crust, the age of the specimen is not older than 7th to 10th century A.D. (or even younger), when the domesticated form appear in SE Europe including the Crimean peninsula. Probably due to its disease, the animal was killed by a sharp axe-like tool and dropped into the cave. In this respect, late Pleistocene musk-ox finds are still missing from the Crimean theriofauna, their Southern range in the area, being limited to Zhytomyr-Kiev-Chernigov regions in Northern Ukraine.