Pleistocene small cave bear (Ursus rossicus) from the South Siberia, Russia

Abstract

[Abstract] The skull, mandibles and cheek teeth of U. Rossicus from four localities of the South Siberia are examined. This species inhabited the steppe regions in early Middle and Late Pleistocene. By odontological characters it is more close to U. r. Rossicus from Krasnodar, than to U. Rossicus uralensis from Kizel Cave in Ural. Discriminant analysis, based on measurements of lower cheek teeth of the cave bears from seven sites of Europe and Siberia, demonstrated that U. Rossicus most resembles morphometrically U. Savini . As a result of cladistic analysis employed 17 characters of skull, limb bones, and dentition, the phylogenetic tree has been obtained for 7 species of the genus U r s u s . A four species of the cave bears are included in the subgenus Spelearctos: U. savini, U. rossicus, U. deningeri and U. spelaeus