Vallaris zappai

Antoñanzas, Raquel López, 2009, First Potwarmus from the Miocene of Saudi Arabia and the early phylogeny of murines (Rodentia: Muroidea), Zoological Journal of the Linnean Society 156, pp. 664-679 : 670

VALLARIS ZAPPAI WESSELS ET AL., 2001

This species was erected by Wessels et al. (2001) on the basis of 459 molars, 19 maxillary fragments, and 29 mandible fragments from the lower Miocene Keseköy locality, Turkey. The holotype of Vallaris zappai is a right M1 ( KE 2093 ) .

The M1s of Vallaris zappai differ from AJ 7 in usually having a short mesoloph, a well-developed anterolophule, an anteriorly weak, but distinct, longitudinal crest, and a posterior cingulum, which has a short lingual branch and bears a hypoconule. The Arabian specimen lacks the mesoloph, the lingual branch of the posterior cingulum, and the hypoconule, and both the anterolophule and longitudinal crest are indistinct. The M2s of V. zappai are distinct from AJ11 and AJ12, for instance, in having a mesoloph, a well-developed longitudinal crest, alternate cusps, a prominent anterolophule, a better developed lingual branch of the anterior cingulum, and long protoloph and metaloph. The morphology of the m1 of V. zappai is also very different from that of AJ13. Vallaris zappai has the anterior part of the m1 unreduced, showing a distinct anteroconid, a mesolophid, alternate cusps, a complete longitudinal crest, long anterolophulid, protolophid and hypolophid, and a posterior cingulum that bears a large hypoconulid.

SPECIES UNDIFFERENTIATED AT THE GENERIC LEVEL