Parrotia aff. persica (DC.)

Denk, Thomas, Sami, Marco, Teodoridis, Vasilis & Martinetto, Edoardo, 2022, The Late Early Pleistocene Flora Of Oriolo, Faenza (Italy): Assembly Of The Modern Forest Biome, Fossil Imprint 78 (1), pp. 217-262 : 225

Parrotia aff. persica (DC.) C.A.MEY., 1831

Text-fig. 4a–e

M a t e r i a l. Oriolo MSF 654-1, 678, 726, 727, 728, 729, 730-1, 731, 734, 743, 849, 853-1, 991, 993, Tebano MSF n.n.

D e s c r i p t i o n. Leaf, petiolate, petiole> 10 mm long, lamina obovate, elliptic to nearly orbicular, 45–87 mm long, 35–67 mm wide, apex obtuse, rarely acute, base acute to obtuse, rounded, base asymmetrical, lamina starting above point of divergence between primary vein and basal pair of secondary veins ( Text-fig. 4c–e ), secondary venation (pseudo)craspedodromous to brochidodromous, secondary vein spacing irregular, the first two pairs of secondary veins usually with several abmedial veins, leaf margin wavy.

Fruits, 2 valved capsules ( Text-fig. 4a ) and seeds (Textfig. 4b), seed 6.5 mm long.

R e m a r k s. Parrotia was widespread in the Neogene of western Eurasia and represented by a single fossil-species, Parrotia pristina (ETTINGSH.) STUR, 1867 ( Adroit et al. 2020). The fossil leaves from Oriolo are very similar to the modern P. persica . However, based on leaf imprints, it is nearly impossible to distinguish Parrotia leaves from those of some Hamamelis spp. (e.g., H. vernalis SARG. ). Because the leaves co-occur with fruits of Parrotia , we assigned both leaf and fruit remains to Parrotia . The fruits are about 10 mm long, as is the fruit from Enza described by Martinetto (2015). This specimen, assigned to Parrotia cf. persica , shares two relevant characters with the fruits from Oriolo ( Text-fig. 4a ): the two style bases are prominent and close to each other. In the smaller Pliocene fruits of Parrotia reidiana KIRCHH., 1957 , from Northwestern Italy (Martinetto 2015), associated with leaves of Parrotia pristina ( Martinetto 2003) , the two style bases are less prominent and usually more broadly spaced. The Pleistocene fossil leaves and fruits from Oriolo agree in morphology with the modern western Eurasian species (see also Roiron 1983, Leroy and Roiron 1996). Hence, we use the open nomenclature merely because the fossil record of Parrotia in the Pleistocene of Italy is more extensive than presently known, and not yet adequately studied. Wood of Parrotia persica has been reported from another section of the late Early Pleistocene, the Arda section ( Pini et al. 2014a), and fruits have been noticed there in the field (Martinetto, pers. obs.), but not yet sampled.

Figures

Text-fig. 4. a–e: Parrotia aff. persica. a: Oriolo MSF 991 capsule. b: Oriolo MSF 994 endocarp. c: Oriolo MSF 654. d: Oriolo MSF 743. e: Oriolo MSF 678. f: Vitis sp. Oriolo MSF 838. g–k: Gleditsia aff. caspica. g: Oriolo MSF 920. h: Oriolo MSF 939. i: Oriolo MSF 787. j: Oriolo MSF 917. k: Oriolo MSF 925. Scale bars 10 mm (a, h–k), 5 mm (b), 50 mm (c–f).