Acta Palaeontologica Polonica

The Montian Warm-water foraminifers in the Meridional Province of Europe

Janina Szczechura and Krystyna Pożaryska

Acta Palaeontologica Polonica 16 (4), 1971: 345-388

The geographical range of the Montian Meridional Province in non-Alpine Europe and its foraminiferal fauna are discussed as a continuation of the authors' previous studies (Pozaryska & Szczechura, 1968 a, b; 1970). The foraminiferal fauna from the Upper Montian of the Crimea is taken as an example and compared with that of other parts of Europe. Most of the 33 species distinguished, including 3 new ones, represent stenothermal forms, analogous to those occurring in the Montian stratotype of Belgium (Puits Goffin). The geographical range of the Meridional Province, which stretches from the Pyrenees up to the Crimea in the form of an arc parallel to the northern margin of the Alpes and Carpathians, has been traced more accurately. The directions of the migration of foraminiferal faunas, within the Meridional Province whose cradle should be looked for as early as in the Upper Maastrichtian in the Belgian-Dutch basin, have been determined. These faunas reached France and West Germany in the early Montian, East Germany and Poland in the somewhat later Montian and the Crimea in the uppermost Montian. That was also the region ,in which the duration of a warm sea with tropical fauna was the shortest.


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