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Sedimentologic, Taphonomic Processes and Paleontological Values of Hungarian Caves
Abstract
The study is an updated summary of the paleontological values of the caves in Hungary in the light of sedimentologic and taphonomic conditions. The localities discussed in chronological order contain their locations, history of excavation, important sedimentologic and taphonomic characteristics, typical paleontologic and/or archaeologic remains, the age and biochronologic positions. Most of the illustrations have historical value, first published here. The reference is containing the basic works, the most important priority papers and the current publications.KeywordsHungaryCavesPaleontologyCave depositsTaphonomyResearch historyPaleoenvironmentChronologyArcheologyCenozoicQuaternary
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Istállóskő Cave is considered as an important Aurignacian site in the Middle Danube basin. L. Vértes recovered two layers of Aurignacian, with split base points from the lower layer, and Olschewa points from the upper one. However, the knapped lithic tools were not classical Aurignacian types. This dual character of the artifact assemblage may be the archaeological evidence for site function. In this paper, we investigated the osseous remains from the two Aurignacian layers through a zooarcheological analysis. The result indicate that the cave was used by cave bears for denning, and the archeological finds are residues of successive human hunting campaigns.
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Die Felsnische von Uppony I, im Norden des Bükk-Gebirges, Ungarn, lieferte eine reiche Säugetier- und Molluskenfauna. Die Wurzeln der Säugetier-Fauna liegen bis zu einem gewissen Grad im „Biharium". Für die obersten Abschnitte der Sedimentfüllung darf Einstufung in eine Kaltphase vor der Rißeiszeit (i. e. S.) angenommen werden. Die Molluskenfauna, im Gesamtzeitraum sich nicht grundsätzlich verändernd, besteht aus Arten des Waldes und des offenen Geländes, wozu sich oben Elemente des Lösses gesellen. Fledermäuse treten in den tiefsten Schichten, die dem Sediment nach weiter innen im ursprünglichen Höhlenraum abgelagert wurden, in größerer Zahl auf. Die Wühlmaus-Reste, aus Eulengewöllen stammend, häufen sich eher bei Umbildung zur Felsnische infolge Rückwitterung des Traufes. Dabei ist eine, parallel mit der Veränderung der Sedimentation zu beobachtende Anreicherung von Wald bewohnenden Arten bzw. der sibirischen Wühlmaus vorhanden.
The eponymous locality of the Middle Palaeolithic industry was first excavated 1913. As a result of nine years investigations, 104 lithic artefacts, made predominantly of radiolarite were collected from the exceptionally thick yellowish red sediment. According to our reconstructions, on the top of the layer s. str. Szeletian artefacts and osseous tools, in the lowermost level Micoquian-type stone tools were found. Unfortunately, the majority of the artefacts, including the retouched Levallois blanks, "raclettes", leaf-shaped implements and some antler tools cannot be linked to well-defined levels. Instead of the connections of the find material with the industries found in southern Germany or on the Balkans, we suggest draw attention to the similarities with the assemblage of layer G1 of the Vindija cave (Croatia).
The Soricidae fauna of Sümeg, Csákvár and Széchenyi Hill (Hungary) is presented. The following taxa were identified in the fauna: Dinosorex sp., Amblycoptus oligodon KORMOS, 1926, Crusafontina endernica GIBERT1974, Crusafontina vicina (KRETZOI, 1954), Blarinella dubia (BACHMAYER& WILSON, 1970), Paenelimnoecus repenningi (BACHMAYER& WILSON,1970), Soricidae gen. et sp. indet. The soricids supply new additions for the determining the detailed stratigraphic position of the localites. Based on the shrew material alI the three assemblages are correlative with the Late Miocene (Sümeg: Vallesian, Csákvár and Széchenyi Hill: Turolian). The present soricids, occurred in these localities, are suggestive of well watered, wooded environments.
A Late Eemian (Marine Isotope Stage 5d) vertebrate fauna was excavated in Horváti-lik (Horváti Hole) at Uppony, NE Hungary, in 1977 and 1978. After the preliminary reports, the authors identified the whole fauna of the 25 layers of the small cave. Following the faunistical and cluster analysis, the 410 cm long profile is divided into three units: the uppermost layers 1–4 are Holocene, layers 5–6 are mixed, and layers 7–21 yielded similar faunal content of early Late Pleistocene age. The rodents are predominant; Microtus arvalis is the most abundant species. The steppe elements are present in high percentage (e. g. Sicista, Ochotona, Citellus, Allocricetus, Spalax, Allactaga, Cricetus and Lagurus), and Dicrostonyx also occurs. Results of the ecotype analysis among the vertebrate fauna of the different Pleistocene layers (number of species, body size, trophic preferences and ecological units) are as follows. Layers 7–20 show similar ecotype, characterized by low diversity, dominance of the smallest body size category, and abundance of the granivores. Layer 21 is somewhat different, because it is containing more larger body size elements and more frequent browser/grazers and omnivores. Using cluster analysis, biochronological methods and correlation with the Marine Isotope Stages and the continental stratigraphic units, the Pleistocene faunas of the Horváti-lik represent a significant steppe phase at the end of the Eemian, correlated with Marine Isotope Stage 5d, or Herning Stadial, dated as 120–110 kyr BP.
With the discovery of the József-hegy Cave, a cave of hydrothermal origin with an abundance of minerals unknown so far in Hungary came to light. Diversity and the frequency of the occurrence of crystals make this cave similar to the Lechuguilla Cave, even if the dimensions of the mineral precipitations and the passages do not compare in scale. The variety and mass of carbonates and sulphates are surprising. This paper describes the minerals and speleothems of the József-hegy Cave, their occurrence and genesis, including determined ages. The 41 U/Th measurements suggest that speleothems begun to develop in the upper level of the cave more than 350 ka ago. Some of these dated old speleothems were developing in dry passages, thus the uppermost passages of the József-hegy Cave have been dry at least for 350 ka. The karst water level was still at the main passage 200 ka ago and dropped to 120 m asl by the time of ~100 ka before present.
A total of 1,514 fossil bones were studied from the Vaskapu II rock shelter (Bükk Mountains, North Hungary). The objective of this study was to investigate those processes of bone modification that were important in the dispersal, destruction and preservation of bone in the deposit. Size-selective taphonomic processes were detected in the accumulation of vertebrate remains. The fossils were transported by water through a 15 m high fissure system above the locality during repeated precipitation and thawing. Size-sorting of the bones occurred within the fissures. During this process the fossils were damaged and fragmented and the remains were eventually emplaced into the Vaskapu II rock shelter. The size-sorting is statistically established by a method based on the chisquare test. This method clearly describes the differences between the life and death assemblages.
The water vole is common in Middle and Late Pleistocene temperate Palaearctic faunas. It is widely used in biostratigraphy because of temporal trends in the size, shape and structure of the first lower molar (m1). However, geographic variation in the evolutionary development of the m1 has restricted the precision and accuracy of age-estimations. This thesis explores morphological variation in the m1 of fossil and extant populations of the lineage Mimomys savini–Arvicola, and uses the phenotype and the genotype to develop evolutionary hypotheses. Geometric and traditional morphometric methods are used to quantify tooth shape and enamel thickness from over 4000 digital photographs of m1s taken from specimens originating from 146 modern and fossil groups across the western Palaearctic. m1s are photographed to obtain a true cross-section, giving a more accurate description of molar shape. Morphological variation is explored in terms of sample-size, taphonomy, and ontogeny. Sample sizes of less than 10 are likely to provide inaccurate summary statistics of morphometric variables but depositional type appears to have no systematic effect on within-group variation. Change in the morphology of m1s through ontogeny is an important source of morphological variation, explaining up to 29% of molar shape within-specimens and up to 95% of enamel thickness within enamel layers of specimens. Removal of ontogenetic variation from mo- lar shape improves congruence between morphological and molecular data, indicating age-corrected variables should be used when assessing evolutionary patterns. Temporal and spatial patterns in the enamel thickness quotient (SDQ), based on age-corrected enamel thicknesses, mirror those from published data but differ in some details. Methodological differences mean absolute SDQ values cannot be compared. Qualitative patterns include a large decrease in SDQ across MIS 12 and a steep east–west morphocline during the late Middle Pleistocene.
The Istállóskő cave, one of the classical sites in Hungary was generally regarded as the only important locality of the Aurignacian culture with two discrete culture-bearing layers. The assemblages played a key role in several theories on the appearance of the Upper Palaeolithic in Europe; however, this is the first time that all the lithic artefacts found since 1912 until 1965 are studied in details.
As a result of our analysis, none of the studied lithic assemblages could be attributed to to the s. str. Aurignacian industry as the diagnostic pieces are absent. Quite atypical fragmented blades and a bifacial tool have been uncovered in the poor ‘lower ( Aurignacian I) culture-bearing layer’, which — together with the rich osseous industry, including split based points — are compared to the assemblages of the Jankovich cave (Transdanubia), the Dzeravá skála/Pálffy cave (Slovakia) and layer G1 in the Vindija cave (Croatia).
In the ‘upper (Aurignacian II) culture-bearing layer’ the few Mladec/Olschewa-type osseous artefacts were associated with Gravettian flint lithics and Middle Palaeolithic and bifacial elements made from radiolarite and felsitic porphyry. This industry is compared to those known from early Gravettian sites and the Szeleta cave.
The paper presents a faunal and taphonomic discussion of the Late Pleistocene bird-bone assemblages excavated in Kálvária Cave no 4 near the city of Tatabánya in north-west Hungary. A total of 1150 complete and fragmentary avian remains were recovered from two locations on two separate occasions. Of these, 873 bones could be identified on the species-, family- or order-level. Fifteen of the identified 19 bird taxa could be determined on the species level and they indicate a habitat typical of forest margins. Several species yielded juvenile or subadult specimens, which in view of the breeding period means that these birds died during the summer, most probably between July and September.Each of the two assemblages had distinct characteristics. The high number of kestrel (Falco tinnunculus) long bones in Assemblage I generally included complete skeletal parts from subadult birds, suggesting a colony which bred in the cave, whose chicks died of natural causes. Even though the bones were exposed to a certain degree of water transport and soil corrosion, they were generally well preserved in the cave sediment. Size-characteristic analyses demonstrated that, in spite of the undeveloped morphological features, the sizes of limb bones usually corresponded to those of adult birds.The greater part of the material in Assemblage II originated from a stratified deposit and was dominated by small and fragmented remains of various taxa. The taxa which could be identified and the taphonomic features of the remains suggest that owl pellets formed the core of this bone assemblage.
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