Dispersal of the Canini (Mammalia, Canidae: Caninae) across Eurasia during the Late Miocene to Early Pleistocene M. Sotnikova a, * , L. Rook b a Geological Institute, Russian Academy of Sciences, Pyzhevsky line, 7,119017 Moscow, Russia b Dipartimento di Scienze della Terra, Universita degli Studi di Firenze, via G. La Pira, 4, 50121 Firenze, Italy article info Article history: Available online 21 June 2009 abstract An analysis of the taxonomy and distribution of the Mio–Pliocene and Pleistocene Eucyon-like and Canis- like canids of the tribe Canini of Eurasia was performed, with a description of several fossils from the Late Miocene and Early Pliocene of Asia. The changes in the assemblages of the Canini generally coincided with the most significant Eurasian faunal turnovers, but the European and Asian diversities of the Canini peaked asynchronously. In the Late Miocene, a wide expansion of the genus Eucyon to the Old World took place, being designated here as the ‘‘Eucyon event’’. The diversity of Eucyon-like Canini peaked at the beginning of the Early Pliocene in Asia and at the end of the Early Pliocene in Europe. The wolf-sized species of the Canis group made their first appearance in Eurasia in the Middle Pliocene, (the ‘‘Canis event’’). The peak of their diversity occurred in the Late Pliocene in Asia and at the beginning of the Early Pleistocene in Europe. At the end of the Pliocene, Eucyon and Eucyon-like canids completely went extinct in Eurasia. The diversity of the Canis group appreciably decreased by the end of the Early to Middle Pleistocene being limited by the occurrence of small wolves of the Canis mosbachensis–Canis variabilis group and large hypercarnivorous Canis (Xenocyon) lycaonoides in Eurasia. The true gray wolves made their appearance at the end of the Middle Pleistocene at about 0.5–0.3 Ma. Ó 2009 Elsevier Ltd and INQUA. All rights reserved. 1. Introduction The extant members of the family Canidae are widely distrib- uted over the Old World. Geologically speaking, however, this is a recent achievement. Throughout most of their history, until the latest Miocene, the distribution of canids was restricted to North America. Their invasion into Eurasia in the late Neogene became an important event in the development of mammal communities of the Old World. Inclusion of canids into the Eurasian biota was associated with essential reorganizations in carnivoran guilds. The greatest changes took place in the composition of the family Hyaenidae as nearly all the hyaenids of dog-like morphotype went extinct. This increased the role of the Canini in mammal commu- nities and caused the appearance of a variety of taxa. In the Pliocene and Early Pleistocene, the forms new to Eurasia had mostly wide geographic ranges and short stratigraphic intervals of existence. This carnivoran group is promising for an integrated analysis of the Plio–Pleistocene biotic evolution, particularly for the event stratigraphy and characterization of most significant mammalian turnovers. Until now, however, the only canid-related event has been well known in the Western Europe, the Late Villafranchian ‘‘wolf event’’ or ‘‘Canis event’’ (Azzaroli, 1983; Azzaroli et al., 1988; Torre et al., 1992; Rook and Torre, 1996a; Spassov, 1998; Sardella and Palombo, 2007). The other Canini members, except for the raccoon dogs of the genus Nyctereutes, have not been practically used for marking the most important Plio–Pleistocene events because of the fragmentary nature of fossils and the lack of their detailed analyses and comparisons of the data from different regions of Eurasia. Synchrony and asynchrony of canid events on the Asian and European subcontinents have not been discussed in the literature. Moreover, until recently all the Mio–Pliocene Canis- like forms have been considered within the only genus Canis, and all the Plio–Pleistocene wolf/coyote-sized canids have been assigned only to few species. The extensive recent research on fossil canids (including the revision of the Eurasian Canini) has revealed their higher diversity in the Old Word (Rook, 1992a, 1993, 1994; Ivanoff,1996; Tedford and Qiu, 1996; Koufos and Kostopoulos, 1997; Qiu et al., 2004; Spassov and Rook, 2006; Sotnikova, 2006; Wang * Corresponding author. Tel.: þ7 495 959 34 98, þ7 495 953 60 75; fax: þ7 495 951 0443. E-mail addresses: sotnik@ginras.ru (M. Sotnikova), lorenzo.rook@unifi.it (L. Rook). Contents lists available at ScienceDirect Quaternary International journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/quaint 1040-6182/$ – see front matter Ó 2009 Elsevier Ltd and INQUA. All rights reserved. doi:10.1016/j.quaint.2009.06.008 Quaternary International 212 (2010) 86–97