De hyena uit de Oosterschelde

This paper deals with a fragment of a right hyena-mandible with the second premolar (P2) in situ. The specimen was dredged from the bottom of the Eastern Scheldt in the province of Zeeland (The Netherlands). Early Pleistocene sediments from the Eastern Scheldt were dated to the Tiglian Complex (TC III, approximately 1.9 Ma) and yield an Early Pleistocene mammalian fauna with, among others, Anancus arvernensis, Mammuthus meridionalis, Eucladoceros ctenoides, Pseudodama rhenanus, a rhino species, a large horse and a carnivore. Until now only gnawing marks -especially on the footbones of the proboscideans- and coprolites of the hyena were known.The morphology and the measurements of the P2 dexter in the mandible fragment show that it could be referred to Hyaena perrieri or Crocuta crocuta spelaea. The fossil is heavily mineralized, which is typical for specimens be longing to the Early Pleistocene mammalian fauna of the Eastern Scheldt. There is also a clear similarity between this fauna and the 1.9 Ma old fauna of Chilhac (Auvergne,France), in which Hyaena perrieri occurs. For these two reasons we prefer to identify the specimen as 'cf. Hyaena perrieri'. Furthermore, information is given on hyaenas which were common in northwestern Europe during the Pleistocene, and on some superb hyena fossils in the collection of the National Museum of Natural History in Leiden. These are referable to Crocuta crocuta spelaea from the Late Pleistocene of the Western Scheldt (province of Zeeland, The Netherlands).