Early Pleistocene Horseshoe Bat Rhinolophus macrorhinus cimmerius subsp. nov. (Rhinolophidae, Chiroptera) from the Taurida Cave in Crimea

Abstract—: Numerous remains (incomplete skull, cranial and mandibular fragments, and isolated teeth) of a large horseshoe bat of the Rhinolophus ferrumequinum group are described from the Lower Pleistocene depo-sits of the Taurida cave in the central Crimea. They are assigned to Rhinolophus macrorhinus cimmerius subsp. nov. In dental characters the new subspecies is less specialized than R. m. anomalidens Topál, 1979 from the Late Villafranchian of Central Europe, which implies the origin of the former from an earlier form morphologically close to R. m. macrorhinus Topál, 1963. The perfect preservation of the cranial structures made it possible to observe the remnants of the palatal ridges and the morphology of the nasal turbinals of R. macro-rhinus cimmerius subsp. nov. © 2022, Pleiades Publishing, Ltd.