RESEARCH ARTICLE
Late Pleistocene () Linnaeus 1758 from the Fuchsluken Cave Near Saalfeld (Thuringia, Germany) - A Porcupine and Hyena Den and Contribution to their Palaeobiogeography in Europe

ABSTRACT

Rare Late Pleistocene porcupine remains of Hystrix (Atherurus) brachyura Linnaeus 1758 are described from the Fuchsluken Cave, a small gypsum karst cavity at the Rote Berg on the Giebelstein near Saalfeld (Thuringia, Central Germany). The cave was used during the Eemian and mainly Early Weichselian (around 120.000-75.000 BP) by spotted hyena clans of Crocuta crocuta spelaea (Goldfuss 1823), which imported prey that resulted in a large bone accumulation in and around the cave. It was also used in the short term by porcupines as their den, such as proven for several Eemian to Early Weichselian cave faunas in Central Europe, especially Germany and Czech Republic, recently. In the cave recycled-by-hyenas cracked megafauna bones were found, on which they had chewed all around. These typically nibbled bones with parallel bite scratches were also found at other European caves such as presented here for two more new Hystrix cave sites in the Moravian Karst (Czech Republic) and indirectly prove their presence at more and more cave sites in Central Europe. Here, the recently learned 21 Late Pleistocene porcupine sites with skeletal material and more often the indirect proof by chewed bones are presented in an overview. Nearly all are cave localities, often being small cavities or the entrance parts of small caves were used as porcupine dens, as is proved here in the Fuchsluken Cave near Saalfeld. In many cases the porcupines used hyena dens and recycled their accumulated bone rubbish