Department of Geology, National Museum of Natural Science, Taichung 404, Taiwan, ROC.
J Hum Evol. 2012 Sep;63(3):439-51. doi: 10.1016/j.jhevol.2012.03.005. Epub 2012 Jun 30.
Here we report on two kinds of cercopithecid fossil monkeys (Cercopithecinae and Colobinae) from the early to middle Pleistocene sediments of the Chochen (=Tsochen) area (Tsailiao-chi or Shinhua Hill), southern Taiwan. The fossil specimens include the first fossil record of colobine monkeys from Taiwan, where only macaque monkeys now occur. All cercopithecine fossils were identified as Macaca cf. Macaca cyclopis, the extant Taiwan macaque, except for one extremely large isolated upper molar, which may belong to another macaque species. On the other hand, all colobine specimens fall within the size variation of extant and extinct Rhinopithecus, but its specific status cannot be determined because of the scantiness of the fossil material. In Taiwan, Rhinopithecus presumably became extinct in the late Pleistocene, probably owing to global cooling and vegetation change, whereas macaques, which are of almost the same body size as Rhinopithecus, survived as M. cyclopis to the present. The contrasting history of survival between the two kinds of monkeys may be due to ecological/behavioral differences between them or as a result of accidental events that occurred in the Pleistocene of Taiwan.
我们在此报告两种栖息在台湾南部早更新世至中更新世层位的猴科（猕猴亚科和疣猴亚科）化石。这些化石标本包括台湾首次发现的疣猴化石记录，台湾现今仅生存有猕猴。所有的猕猴化石被鉴定为台湾猕猴，除了一颗极其巨大的孤立上臼齿，可能属于另一个猕猴物种。另一方面，所有的疣猴标本的体型变化都与现生和已灭绝的滇金丝猴相似，但由于化石材料稀少，其具体分类地位无法确定。在台湾，滇金丝猴可能在晚更新世灭绝，可能是由于全球变冷和植被变化所致，而体型与滇金丝猴几乎相同的猕猴，则以台湾猕猴的形式幸存至今。这两种猴子在生存历史上的截然不同，可能是由于它们之间的生态/行为差异，或是由于在台湾更新世发生的偶然事件。
