Lower Tortonian chitons from the Korytnica clays, southern slopes of the Holy Cross Mts

Abstract

A very rich assemblage of chitons from the Lower Tortonian Pleurotoma clays exposuring at Korytnica .(southern slopes of the Holy Cross Mts, Central Poland), is represented by 17 species (including 5 new ones), the most frequent of which are Lepidopleurus decoratus (Reuss) and Chiton denudatus Reuss. The paper presents description of the species and characteristics of their life environment. The assemblage under study has been compared with assemblages from other Miocene localities and with the Recent Mediterranean community. A great similarity has been found to the chitons from the Vienna Basin and, on the other hand, a considerable impoverishment of the Mediterranean community as compared with the Miocene assemblages. The relationship between the Miocene and Recent species has also been discussed.