Prometheomys Satunin 1901

Wilson, Don E. & Reeder, DeeAnn, 2005, Order Rodentia - Family Cricetidae, Mammal Species of the World: a Taxonomic and Geographic Reference (3 rd Edition), Volume 2, Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press, pp. 955-1189 : 1037

Prometheomys Satunin 1901

Prometheomys Satunin 1901 , Zool. Anz., 24: 572.

Type Species: Prometheomys schaposchnikowi Satunin 1901

Species and subspecies: 1 species:

Species Prometheomys schaposchnikowi Satunin 1901

Discussion: Prometheomyini. The only extant member of an archaic line that most specialists isolate as a tribe within Arvicolinae ( Gromov and Polyakov, 1977; Hooper and Hart, 1962; Kretzoi, 1955, 1969; McKenna and Bell, 1997; Musser and Carleton, 1993; Pavlinov and Rossolimo, 1987; Zagorodnyuk, 1990). Repenning et al. (1990), however, aligned Prometheomys with another presumed relic, Ellobius , in Prometheomyinae. A third view was offered by Pavlinov et al. (1995 a) and Pavlinov and Rossolimo (1998), who sequestered Prometheomys within its own subtribe of a broadly defined Prometheomyini (also Alticola , Clethrionomys [= Myodes ], Dicrostonyx , Dinaromys , Eolagurus , Eothenomys , Hyperacrius , and Lagurus in other subtribes).

Fossil occurrences date from the late Pleistocene of W Asia ( Agadzhanyan, 1993; McKenna and Bell, 1997). Stachomys , which ranged widely from Germany to the Lake Baikal region during the middle and late Pliocene, may be the progenitor of Prometheomys , which survived as a relict in the Caucasus Mtns ( Agadzhanyan, 1993) .