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Results for Miocene:

Miocene: CATEGORY: chronology
DEFINITION: A geological epoch of the Tertiary period in the earth's history, in which many of the great mountain chains were formed and mammals came to dominate animal life. During this epoch, many mammals of modern form, such as dogs, horses, and humanlike apes, evolved. The Miocene occurred after the Oligocene and before the Pliocene and is dated between 25-5 (23.7-5.3) million years ago. It is often divided into the Early Miocene epoch (23.7 to 16.6 million years ago), the Middle Miocene epoch (16.6 to 11.2 million years ago), and the Late Miocene epoch (11.2 to 5.3 million years ago). The Miocene may also be divided into six ages and their corresponding rock stages: from oldest to youngest these ages or stages are the Aquitanian, Burdigalian, Langhian, Serravallian, Tortonian, and Messinian.
bear: CATEGORY: fauna
DEFINITION: A large carnivore of the family Ursidae, closely related to the dog (family Canidae) and raccoon (Procyonidae). The bear is the most recently evolved of carnivores and it appears to have diverged from the dog family during the Miocene. It evolved through such forms as the Pliocene Hyaenarctos (of Europe, Asia, and North America), into modern types such as the black and brown bear (Ursus). Today's bears are of three groups: the brown bears, the black bears, and the polar bear. Occasional finds of fossil polar bear bones outside the Arctic Circle are presumably related to the presence of pack ice and ice shelves at the edges of ice sheets during glaciations. Brown bears existed in Europe and Asia during the late Quaternary period. One very large variant evolved in Europe, the 'Cave Bear', whose fossils are quite common in Quaternary cave deposits.
dryopithecine: CATEGORY: typology
DEFINITION: Generic term for the Miocene fossil ancestor of both the living apes and modern humans
mastodon: CATEGORY: fauna
DEFINITION: Any of the various now-extinct species of large mammals related to elephants. It looked like a stocky, long elephant, had long reddish-brown hair, and shorter, straighter tusks than the mammoth. The American mastodon (Mammut americanum), is classified as a browser from its low-crowned teeth, as opposed to the woolly mammoth (Mammuthus primigenius), which because of its high-crowned teeth, is classified as a grazer. It lived on spruce and pine. The mastodon had large hemispherical cusps on the surface of each molar tooth. They first appeared in the early Miocene and continued in various forms through the Pleistocene Epoch (from 1,600,000-10,000 years ago). In North America, mastodons probably persisted into post-Pleistocene time and were contemporaneous with historic North American Indian groups. Mastodons had a worldwide distribution; their remains are quite common and are often very well preserved. Hunting may have led to its extinction.
Middle Awash: CATEGORY: site
DEFINITION: River valley of northeast Ethiopia with rich Hominid fossil finds as well as archaeological sites dating from the Miocene to the Holocene. Australopithecine fossils from c 4.5-2.5 million years ago (mainly A. afarensis) and some of the oldest-known stone artifacts in the world (flaked cobble Oldowan Complex, c 3-2.5 mya) were found there.
Neogene period: CATEGORY: chronology
DEFINITION: The upper division of the Tertiary system including the Miocene and Pliocene periods; latest of the two divisions of the Cenozoic Era (66.4 million years ago to the present). The Neogene includes the Miocene and Pliocene epochs (23,700,000-1,600,000 years ago) and is considered by some to encompass the time up to the present. The Neogene, which means new born was designated as such to emphasize that the marine and terrestrial fossils found in the strata of this time were more closely related to each other than to those of the preceding period called the Paleogene. The term Neogene is widely used in Europe as a geologic division, but is generally not employed in North America, where the Cenozoic Era is simply divided into the Tertiary Period (66,400,000-1,600,000 years ago) and the Quaternary Period (1,600,000 years ago to the present).
Oligocene: SYNONYMS OR RELATED TERMS: Oligocene Epoch
CATEGORY: chronology
DEFINITION: Major worldwide division of the Tertiary Period that began about 36.6 million years ago and ended about 23.7 million years ago. It follows the Eocene Epoch and precedes the Miocene Epoch. The term Oligocene is derived from Greek and means the epoch of few recent forms referring to the sparseness of the number of modern animals that originated during the Oligocene. Many large mountain systems and herbivorous mammals began to develop, however. During this epoch, many of the older types of mammals became extinct and the first apes appeared. The largest land mammal of all time, Baluchitherium, is known from Asia, and the first mastodons are known from Egypt. In North America, primitive horses were evolving, including three-toed forms such as Mesohippus and Miohippus. Pigs and peccaries first appeared in the early Oligocene of Europe and reached North America late in the epoch. The earliest apelike form, Parapithecus, is known from Oligocene deposits in Egypt, which also have yielded remains of several kinds of Old World monkeys. The earliest New World monkeys are known from late Oligocene deposits in South America.
Pliocene: CATEGORY: chronology
DEFINITION: The latest geological epoch of the Tertiary period; the epoch dating between c 5 million years ago and the beginning of the Pleistocene (c 1.8 million years ago). During the Pliocene, mammals such as the elephant, horse, ox, and deer appeared, in addition to ancestors of man. It followed the Miocene. There was a separation of the Homo genus and the Australopithecus genus; the first worked tools and the first camps. It is often divided into the Early Pliocene Epoch (5.3 to 3.4 million years ago) and the Late Pliocene Epoch (3.4 to 1.8 million years ago). The Pliocene is also subdivided into two ages and their corresponding rock stages -- the Zanclean and the Piacenzian.
Tertiary: CATEGORY: chronology
DEFINITION: The geological period following the Mesozoic (Secondary) era, constituting the first of two periods of the Cenozoic Era, the second being the Quaternary. It comprises the epochs Palaeocene, Eocene, Oligocene, Miocene, and Pliocene. It extended from the end of the Cretaceous to the beginning of the Quaternary, from 66.4-1.6 million years ago. The Miocene and Pliocene epochs were important in Hominid Evolution. Some prefer not to use the term Tertiary and instead divide the interval into two periods, the Paleogene Period (66.4-23.7 mya) and the Neogene Period (23.7-1.6 mya). Most of the existing mountain belts and ranges, notably the Andes, the Rockies, the Alps, the Himalayas, and the Atlas Mountains, were formed either partly or wholly during the Tertiary. The emergence and submergence of land bridges between continents, especially between North and South America, Eurasia and Africa, and Asia and North America, critically affected the migration of faunas and floras. The earliest generally accepted hominid fossils, those of Australopithecus, come from rocks of Pliocene age (5.3-1.6 mya) in eastern Africa.

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