Lower Cambrian shallow-water carbonates enclosing microbial structures are documented for the first time from the upper Lastours Member of the Montagne Noire (southern France). Microbial organisms constructed self-supported boundstones resulting in the formation of exclusively microbial-accreted buildups, which exhibit three main types of non-skeletal microbialites: planar stratiform stromatolites, dome-shaped stromatolites and nonlaminated (thrombolitic) biostromes. In addition, thrombolitic boundstones display four distinct microbial microstructures: clotted and Renalcis-like forms, branching bushy forms, clusters of unbranching straight filaments and crustose forms.

The upper member of the Lastours Formation records an upward transition from a shalydominant open shelf to a protected shelf environment bounded by a surface representing a major subaerial exposure. Initially, at the inception of the highstand systems tract, flat stratiform stromatolites formed on open sea subtidal shaly substrates, while stacked domal stromatolites developed in peritidal areas which record subaerial exposure. In contrast, prograding shoal barriers of the transgressive systems tract favoured the establishment of thrombolitic boundstones in protected (back-shoal) environments.

A new temnospondyl, Thabanchuia oomie gen. et sp. nov., is described from three skulls and associated postcranial elements from the Early Triassic Lystrosaurus Zone of South Africa. T. oomie is the best-preserved member of the Tupilakosauridae, a temnospondyl taxon previously known only from disarticulated material from Russia and Greenland, but shown here to include Kourerpeton bradyi, an articulated specimen with no locality data but presumed to be from North America. Tupilakosaurids are the only Mesozoic survivors of the dvinosaurian radiation, the sister group to the archegosaurs of the Permian plus the stereospondyl clade. It is postulated that their occurrence in Russia, Greenland and North America represents a reinvasion from Gondwana, where they survived the Late Permian extinctions along with the stem of the stereospondyl clade. T. oomie is probably immature but, like other members of the dvinosaurian clade, was fully aquatic, had ossified ceratobranchials and most likely an increased number of vertebrae and reduced limbs. Like Tupilakosaurus, T. oomie had diplospondylous centra.

A new chasmataspid (Chelicerata, Chasmataspida) is described as Forfarella mitchelli gen. et sp. nov. from the Lower Devonian of Scotland. This species is problematic in that it was catalogued under the name Forfarella mitchelli Waterston (no date), but was never formally described. Furthermore, its type locality is uncertain. Chasmataspids are a poorly known taxon within Chelicerata which appear to be closely related to eurypterids. F. mitchelli is only the fourth chasmataspid species to be described. Though poorly preserved, it shows affinities with other Devonian chasmataspids and supports the hypothesis that this group may have been more geographically widespread in the Devonian than has previously been recognised.

The Pliocene Hipparion from La Gloria 4, La Calera, Orrios 1 and 3, Villalba Alta Río 1, Villalba Alta (Teruel basin) and Layna (Soria province), all in Spain, and Dorkovo (Sofia, Bulgaria), are described and tested by multivariate analysis. These Spanish and Dorkovo forms are compared with the specimens from Pavlodar (large-sized) and Kalmakpai (both in Kazakhstan), Çalta (large-sized, Turkey), the Roussillon (France) and Alcoy (Spain). The faunal assemblages indicate an Early and Late Alfambrian age (Ruscinian, MN14 and MN15) for the Spanish Hipparion and Early Alfambrian (MN14) for Dorkovo specimens. Hipparion remains from Pliocene Spanish localities show a very similar structure. They are referred to Hipparion fissurae, except Orrios 1 assigned to Hipparion aff. H. fissurae and Villalba Alta classified as Hipparion cf. H. fissurae. Despite certain relationships between Hipparion from Layna and Pavlodar, the multivariate analysis confirms the independence of both forms: H. fissurae in Layna, and H. longipes in Pavlodar. The specimens from Kalmakpai present many features close or intermediate to Layna and Pavlodar forms. Finally, Hipparion from Dorkovo is determined as Hipparion cf. H. crassum. These remains have a great morphological resemblance to H. crassum from Roussillon.

A new occurrence of the Hirnantia brachiopod fauna is documented from the Criadero Quartzite of Almadén, Ciudad Real Province, Spain. This unit is the regional development of a largely unfossiliferous sandy facies that frequently overlies the typical Late Ordovician diamictitic glaciomarine formations in the Iberian Peninsula and the Armorican Massif. The new occurrence establishes palaeontologically the latest Ashgill age of the quartzite, at least for its lowest horizons, and adds new data on a fauna that, although widespread, has been very rarely documented from peri-Gondwanan Europe. The new collection contains only Hirnantia sagittifera and Plectothyrella crassicosta chauveli. The subspecific status of the latter and its inclusion within Plectothyrella crassicosta is discussed herein, based on the continuous variation in rib thickness of several samples of both forms. The extremely low diversity and the occurrence of the key form P. c. chauveli, are both typical of the Bani Province that developed on the subpolar margins of Gondwana. This contrasts with other occurrences of the Hirnantia Fauna in peri-Gondwanan Europe, such as those from Sardinia and the Carnic Alps, which are characteristic of the more temperate Kosov Province.

The Tetraconodontinae Lydekker, 1876 are a subfamily of pigs (Suidae) with a great variety of dental adaptations, such as greatly enlarged or reduced premolars, enlarged posterior molars, hypsodonty, enlarged incisors etc. The essence of most of these adaptations can be described very well by simple biometry. Size increase of the last molars has proved to be of importance in African biostratigraphy. However, it appears that members of different lineages have been mixed up.

Tendencies in relative premolar size indicate that the 21 species known can be grouped in three tribes: (1) the Tetraconodontini, with very large or even extremely enlarged premolars and, in one of the lineages, a tendency to enlarge the posterior molars; (2) the Nyanzachoerini new tribe, characterised by moderately enlarged or even reduced premolars and with a tendency to increase the length of the posterior molars by the addition of distal cusps; and (3) the Parachleuastochoerini new tribe, with relatively long but narrower premolars. Both Nyanzachoerini and Tetraconodontini include species that were placed previously in Conohyus and Nyanzachoerus.

A very long gradually evolving lineage in the Nyanzachoerini, spanning 13 Ma, is documented. In the last 5 Ma of this lineage, M3 length increased at such a rate that a (sub)species can be recognised about every 0·7 Ma. Slightly lesser rates of evolution are found in some other lineages, but still others experienced apparently long periods of stasis or very slow evolution. In a single case there is a period of stasis combined with a sudden evolutionary jump as in the punctuated equilibria model.

In the cases of intercontinental dispersal events combined with cladogenesis, where the ancestor in the continent of origin could be identified, the cause of cladogenesis seems to have been geographical isolation. Two tetraconodont lineages were restricted to Eurasia for about 5 Ma. During the Late Miocene, members of these lineages dispersed repeatedly to Africa. The Vallesian is a period of profound climatic changes which are reflected in changes in biogeography of many taxa. It is assumed that these and later climatic changes enabled the dispersal of Tetraconodontinae to Africa.

Two species of Tetraconodontinae dispersed in the early Late Miocene from Eurasia into Africa. Tetraconodontinae then became the dominant pigs in the African Late Miocene and Pliocene. Although the dispersal to Africa must have come from SW Asia, no Tetraconodontinae were known from the area dating from the time of this dispersal.

In this paper, a tetraconodontine tooth from the Nuri Yamut locality near AlÇitepe in European Turkey is described. In morphology, size and in geographical and stratigraphical position this tooth is close to a form that is ancestral to part of the African Tetraconodontinae. The tooth is assigned to cf. Conohyus giganteus, one of the species that dispersed to Africa.

The dispersals of these Tetraconodontinae seem to be more or less coeval with that of Hipparion and are assumed to be allowed for by a change in global climate.