Late-glacial mammoth skeletons (Mammuthusprimigenius) from Condover (Shropshire, UK): anatomy, pathology, taphonomy and chronological significance
Abstract
The Condover mammoths, discovered by chance in 1986, are a remarkably well-preserved assemblage of partial skeletons unique in western and central Europe. The skeletons were preserved in a kettle-hole infill and recovered ex situ, requiring careful anatomical reconstruction. This revealed the skeleton of a 28-year-old adult male woolly mammoth (Mammuthus primigenius), largely complete except for the cranium, the partial skeletons of four or five juveniles in the age range 3-6 years, plus sparse remains of a subadult individual. The adult skeleton bears several traces of pathology, particularly a badly fractured but re-healed scapula. The presence of blowfly puparia within bone cavities, together with other environmental data and a consideration of mammoth biology, allow a detailed reconstruction of the taphonomy of the skeletons, which appear to have become mired within the kettle-hole. The discovery of complete skeletons from a stratified, dated context contributes strong evidence for the survival of mammoths in Britain and western Europe into the Devensian Late-glacial ca. 14.5-14.0 ka cal BP, within Greenland Interstadial 1. Copyright
- Publication:
-
Geological Journal
- Pub Date:
- July 2009
- DOI:
- 10.1002/gj.1162
- Bibcode:
- 2009GeolJ..44..447L