The Earliest Known Radiation of Pitheciine Primates.

ABSTRACT: Two of the more interesting and controversial platyrrhine primate taxa from the Miocene of Patagonia are Soriacebus and Mazzonicebus. Although they are known basically from isolated teeth and partial mandibles and maxillae, their morphology is highly distinctive. Opinions about their phylogenetic relationships differ widely. We interpret these fossils as belonging to the lineage of the anatomically derived, living pitheciine seed-predators; others hold the view that they are stem platyrrhines with convergent adaptations with pitheciines (with the single exception of Proteropithecia among the Patagonian forms), somewhat distant relatives converging coincidently with pitheciines. Here we tested these hypotheses in two ways: (1) by summarizing a character analysis of taxonomically informative

SUBMITTER: Novo NM 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC12082270 | biostudies-literature | 2025 May

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature