Available online at www.sciencedirect.com Palaeoworld 20 (2011) 75–83 Research paper Nypa fruits and seeds from the Maastrichtian–Danian sediments of Bir Abu Minqar, South Western Desert, Egypt Maher I. El-Soughier a,c , R.C. Mehrotra d , Zhi-Yan Zhou a,b,∗ , Gong-Le Shi b a State Key Laboratory of Palaeobiology and Stratigraphy, Nanjing Institute of Geology and Palaeontology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, 39 East Beijing Road, Nanjing 210008, China b Department of Palaeobatany and Palynology, Nanjing Institute of Geology and Palaeontology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, 39 East Beijing Road, Nanjing 210008, China c South Valley University, Aswan Faculty of Science, Geology Department, Aswan, 81528, Egypt d Birbal Sahni Institute of Palaeobotany, 53 University Road, Lucknow 226007, India Received 20 October 2009; received in revised form 19 September 2010; accepted 20 September 2010 Available online 29 September 2010 Abstract Fossil fruits and seeds of Nypa burtinii (Brongniart) of Arecaceae are described from the Maastrichtian and Danian sediments of the Dakhla Formation of Bir Abu Minqar, South Western Desert, Egypt. These fruits represent one of the oldest fossil records of the genus Nypa, contempo- raneous with those known from the Deccan Intertrappean beds of India. As Nypa is now distributed along the sea coast from Sri Lanka to North Australia and New Guinea, the present discovery along with the known associated plant and invertebrate fossils reveals that a tropical littoral, swampy and estuary biota emerged early in the Maastrichtian in the region. © 2010 Elsevier Ltd and Nanjing Institute of Geology and Palaeontology, CAS. All rights reserved. Keywords: Nypa burtinii; Maastrichtian–Danian; South Western Desert; Egypt; Palaeogeography; Palaeoecology 1. Introduction Currently, the monospecific genus Nypa is the only mangrove palm in the fossil record. It is represented mostly by its fruit (Nipa Thunberg, Nypa Steck, Nipadites Bowerbank, or referred as Burtinia, Castellinia, Fracastoria, etc., see Tralau, 1964), often by its pollen (Spinizonocolpites Muller), and rarely by its leaves (Pole and Macphail, 1996; Plaziat et al., 2001; Mehrotra et al., 2003; Harley, 2006). The research history of Nypa fossils has been discussed and summarized by many authors (Reid and Chandler, 1933; Chandler, 1954, 1961; Tralau, 1964; Gregor and Hagn, 1982; Biosca and Via, 1987; Collinson, 1993; Chitaley and Nambudiri, 1995; Gee, 2001; Plaziat et al., 2001; Mehrotra et al., 2003). A number of specific and generic names were applied to fossil Nypa fruits based on different external morphological features, including shapes and size of fruits, but such differences may ∗ Corresponding author at: Nanjing Institute of Geology and Palaeontology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, 39 East Beijing Road, Nanjing 210008, China. E-mail address: zyzhou@nigpas.ac.cn (Z.-Y. Zhou). well be found in different developmental stages of the fruit, or in different parts of the fruiting head in the extant species Nypa fruticans Wurmb. Some fossil generic names (e.g., Rubiaceo- carpum Kräusel, 1939, seeds with outer integument preserved) were erected based on specimens in different states of preser- vation of the fruit or seeds. So far, only Nypa australis Pole et Macphail (1996) described from the Eocene of Tasmania is known to be distinguishable from other Nypa fossils and the living species by cuticle structure of frond. There is no other generally accepted fossil species of Nypa than N. burtinii (or N. cf. fruticans)(Reid and Chandler, 1933; Chandler, 1954; Tralau, 1964; Collinson, 1993). While some authors prefer using the extant specific name N. fruticans for fossil Nypa fruits (Mehrotra et al., 2007), most palaeobotanists distinguish them from the extant species and refer them as N. burtinii (Brongniart) Etting- shausen. The anatomy of fossil Nypa fruits so far known is also different in some respects from that of the living species (Stockmans, 1936; Chitaley and Nambudiri, 1995). The natural home of extant Nypa is restricted to the palaeotropics (Indo-Australasia), despite the presence of suit- able climate and habitat in the neotropics as indicated by successful re-introduction of Nypa in the Americas (Duke, 1871-174X/$ – see front matter © 2010 Elsevier Ltd and Nanjing Institute of Geology and Palaeontology, CAS. All rights reserved. doi:10.1016/j.palwor.2010.09.016