first fossil jewel beetle (insecta: coleoptera: buprestidae)
TRANSCRIPT
Received 28 January 2021 accepted 15 March 2021 middot Editor Stanislav Abadjiev 31
Historia naturalis bulgarica 42 31ndash34ISSN 2603-3186 (online) | ISSN 0205-3640 (print) middot nmnhscomhistoria-naturalis-bulgarica
httpsdoiorg1048027hnb42052Publication date [online] 17 March 2021
Research article
First fossil jewel beetle (Insecta Coleoptera Buprestidae) fromMiddleMiocene deposits in Bulgaria
Nikolay Simov1 Mario Langourov2 Vladimir Sakalian3 Vladimir Bozukov4
(1) National Museum of Natural History Bulgarian Academy of Sciences 1 Tsar Osvoboditel Blvd 1000 Sofia Bulgariasimovnmnhscom httpsorcidorg0000-0003-1626-2964
(2) National Museum of Natural History Bulgarian Academy of Sciences 1 Tsar Osvoboditel Blvd 1000 Sofia Bulgarialangourovnmnhscom httpsorcidorg0000-0001-6756-3420
(3) Institute of Biodiversity and Ecosystem Research Bulgarian Academy of Sciences 1 Tsar Osvoboditel Blvd 1000 SofiaBulgaria vladimirsakaliangmailcom
(4) Institute of Biodiversity and Ecosystem Research Bulgarian Academy of Sciences 23 Acad G Bonchev Street 1113Sofia Bulgaria vladimir_bozukovyahoocom
Abstract The first fossil jewel beetle discovered in Bulgaria is reported from deposits of the Satovcha Basin dated to theMiddle Miocene
Keywords Balkans Buprestidae Miocene Rhodopes Satovcha
Introduction
The present contribution is a continuation of the studyof the fossil insects from deposits of the SatovchaBasin dated to the Middle Miocene Up to now thefossil dragonflies and March flies were investigatedfrom the region (Nel et al 2016 Simov et al 2021)
Here we present the first data of Miocene fossil co-leopterans from Bulgaria which represent also the firstrecord of the fossil representative of the familyBuprestidae from the country
Material and methods
The studied fossil specimens were collected during thepalaeobotanical expeditions in the region of Satovchain the period 1958ndash1967 and in the beginning of the1980s (Nel et al 2016 Simov et al 2021)
The Satovcha Basin (Satovcha Graben) which islocated on the southern slopes of the western Rhodopes(SW Bulgaria) unfolds to the east from the Satovcha
Village Blagoevgrad District The site corresponds to alarge deep eutrophic freshwater palaeolake (Vatsev ampPirumova 1983 Vatsev 1999) It is filled with Tertiaryfreshwater sedimentary and volcanic rocks Two offi-cial lithostratigraphic units are recognised in the basinthe Satovcha Formation and the Sivik Formation (Vat-sev amp Pirumova 1983) The Sivik Formation coversthe Oligocene volcanics and the sediments of theSatovcha Formation The sedimentary rocks of theSivik Formation lie discordantly on them and consist ofsandstones aleurolites sandy clays and diatomiteswith coal streaks (Vatsev amp Pirumova 1983 Vatsev1999 Ivanov 2013) The fossil insects reported herewere discovered in the Sivik Formation They havebeen preserved as compression fossils in diatomiteclays with only minor relief
Based on the total content of the macroflora fromall layers of the Sivik Formation Bozukov (2002) hasdetermined its age as Middle Miocene That dating wasalso confirmed by the pollen analysis (Ivanov 20042012 2013) and accepted in Nel et al (2016) andSimov et al (2021) Since the studied fossil insects ori-
Nikolay Simov Mario Langourov Vladimir Sakalian Vladimir Bozukov
32 Historia naturalis bulgarica 42 (2021)
Fig 1 Dicercini gen sp indet (Coleoptera Buprestidae) Cat-III-2151 Division of Palaeobotany and Palynology Institute ofBiodiversity and Ecosystem Research Bulgarian Academy of Sciences Sofia Bulgaria Scale = 10 mm
Fig 2 Same apical part of the abdomen with visible apicalpart of the aedeagus Scale = 4 mm
ginated from the lower part of Sivik Formation theirage should be considered as Middle Miocene
Specimens were observed in dry state and photo-graphed with camera Panasonic Lumix FZ82 Allstructures were measured (in mm) as preserved Thefossil specimens are deposited in the collections of theDivision of Palaeobotany and Palynology Institute ofBiodiversity and Ecosystem Research BulgarianAcademy of Sciences (IBER-BAS)
Results and discussion
Systematic palaeontology
Coleoptera Linnaeus 1758Buprestidae Leach 1815Dicercini Gistel 1848gen sp indet (Figs 1ndash2)
Material male Cat-III-2151 (part) Division of Palaeo-botany and Palynology Institute of Biodiversity andEcosystem Research Bulgarian Academy of Sciences(IBER-BAS) Sofia Bulgaria
Description Cat-III-2151 (part) (Fig 1) Medium-to big- sized beetle length 22 mm width 105 mm 21times as long as wide Dorsolaterally embeddedstrongly compressed Body brown to dark brown withdarker parts of the pronotal disk and medial parts of thefirst 23 of ventral terga Head not preserved Pronotumtransverse moderately cordate Pronotum length 86mm and width 105 mm Elytra obliquely truncate athumeri sides then subparallel to mid length arcuate tonear apices and regularly arcuate just before apicesElytra length ca 155 mm width 55 mm lengthwidth
First fossil jewel beetle (Insecta Coleoptera Buprestidae) from Middle Miocene deposits in Bulgaria
33Historia naturalis bulgarica 42 (2021)
= 282 Rather short and wide and finely punctato-stri-ate Hind legs with pale brown to brown femurs anddarker tibia robust hind tibia 5 mm long Last abdom-inal segment with broadly and gently arched apexPartly extruded aedeagus is visible ndash widened in an-terior half narrowed in apical part (Fig 2)
Remarks
The combination of the following features shows thatthe beetle undoubtedly belongs to family Buprestidaebody nearly cylindrical slightly flattened elongate-ovoid cuneiform pronotum irregularly quadrateslightly narrowed in front and elytrae apically acumin-ate (Bellamy amp Volkovitsh 2005) The big size (22mm) glabrous body cordate pronotum small scutel-lum and more or less arcuate and finely punctato-stri-ate elytra suggest it could be placed in the tribe Dicer-cini Last abdominal segment with broadly and gentlyarched apex suggests the specimen is not of Chryso-chroini In general habitus the fossil beetle resemblesmuch more representatives of the genera Lampetis De-jean 1833 or Perotis Dejean 1833 or other DicerciniThe incomplete preservation of the specimen does notallow species description or affiliation to exact genus
The composition of the rich flora (Bozukov 1998a1998b 1999a 1999b 2000) supported the humidwarm-temperate to subtropical climate of this time in-terval (with temperatures above 15ndash16degC and precipit-ation above 1000 mm) with frostless winters while thevegetation corresponds to the mixed mesophytic forest(Ivanov 2012 2013) In terms of floristic compositionthe fossil flora of Satovcha is closest to ldquoevergreenbroadleaved forestrdquo and ldquomixed semi-evergreen forestrdquoof Southeast Asia (Bozukov 2001 2002 Ivanov 20122013) Such conditions correspond well with the cli-matic requirements of the extant representatives of theabove-cited buprestid genera Lampetis and Perotisand Dicercini at all were widely distributed in presenttimes in the tropic-subtropic regions ofAsiaAfrica andboth Americas
The discoveries of first fossil Buprestidae from theMiddle Miocene in Bulgaria is of palaeobiogeograph-ical importance Currently this is one of the oldestMiocene fossil records of Dicercini in Europe A fewdescribed fossil species Perotis bruckmanni Heer1862 P lavateri Heer 1847 Capnodis antiqua Heer1847 C puncticollis Heer 1847 and C spectabilisHeer 1862 originated from the locality of Oumlhningen
(South Germany) with the age assigned to the LateMiocene (Selmeier 1990 Lutz 1997 Fikaacuteček ampSchmied 2013)
Acknowledgements
The authors are greatly indebted to Mark Volkovitsh(Zoological Institute Saint Petersburg) and one an-onymous reviewer for reviews and valuable criticalcomments and remarks
References
Bellamy CL 2008 A World Catalogue and Biblio-graphy of the Jewel Beetles (ColeopteraBuprestoidea) Volume 2 Chrysochroinae Spheno-pterini through Buprestinae Stigmoderini 626ndash1260
Bellamy CL Volkovitsh MG 2005 Chapter 17Buprestoidea Crowson 1955 pp 461ndash468 InBeutel RG Leschen RAB (eds) Handbook ofZoology Volume IV Arthropoda Insecta Part 38Coleoptera Beetles Volume 1 Morphology andSystematics W de Gruyter Berlin New York 567pp
Bozukov V 1998a Miocene macroflora of the SatovchaGraben (Western Rhodopes) I Systematics 1Equisetophyta Polypodiophyta Pinophyta Phyto-logia Balcanica 4 (1ndash2) 3ndash12
Bozukov V 1998b Miocene macroflora of theSatovcha Graben (Western Rhodopes) I System-atics 2 Lauraceae Magnoliaceae Cercidiphylla-ceae Hamamelidaceae Ulmaceae MoraceaePhytologia Balcanica 4 (3) 3ndash12
Bozukov V 1999a Miocene macroflora of the SatovchaGraben (Western Rhodopes) I Systematics 3Fagaceae Betulaceae Phytologia Balcanica 5 (1)3ndash13
Bozukov V 1999b Miocene macroflora of theSatovcha Graben (Western Rhodopes) I System-atics 4 Myricaceae Juglandaceae TheaceaeSalicaceae Ericaceae Myrsinaceae TiliaceaeSterculiaceae Fabaceae Meliaceae Anacardia-ceae Rutaceae Aceraceae Sapindaceae Styra-caceae Cornaceae Phytologia Balcanica 5 (2ndash3)47ndash62
Bozukov V 2000 Miocene macroflora of the SatovchaGraben (Western Rhodopes) I Systematics 5
Magnoliophyta Araliaceae Aquifoliaceae Cela-straceae Rhamnaceae Vitaceae ApocynaceaeCaprifoliaceae Convolvulaceae MacclintockiaSmilacaceae Cyperaceae Sparganiaceae Typha-ceae Phytologia Balcanica 6 (1) 15ndash29
Bozukov V 2001 Miocene macroflora of the SatovchaGraben (Western Rhodopes) II Paleofloristic pa-leoecological and phytogeographical analysisPhytologia Balcanica 7 (1) 13ndash33
Bozukov V 2002 Miocene macroflara of the SatovchaGraben (Western Rhodopes) III Comparative ana-lysis of the Satovcha paleoflora with benchmarkEuropean macrofloras Geological age of the pa-leoflora Phytologia Balcanica 8 (2) 165ndash180
Fikaacuteček M Schmied H 2013 Insect Fauna of the LateMiocene Locality of Oumlhningen (Germany) LessDiverse Than Reported An Example of the Hydro-philid Beetles (Coleoptera) Journal of Paleonto-logy 87 (3) 427ndash443
Heer O 1847 Die Insektenfauna der Tertiaumlrgebilde vonOeningen und von Radoboj in Croatien ErsterTheil Kaumlfer 229 pp
Heer O 1862 Beitraumlge zur Insektenfauna OeningensColeoptera Geodephagen HydrocantharidenGyriniden Brachelytren Clavicornen Lamelli-cornen und Buprestiden Natuurkundige Verhan-delingen van de Hollandsche Maatschappij derWetenschappen te Haarlem 16 (2) 1ndash90
Ivanov D 2004 Pollen of some exotic plants in theNeogene of Bulgaria Acta Palaeobotanica 44 (1)69ndash77
Ivanov D 2012 New palynological data on some sub-tropical floristic elements of the Middle Mioceneof Bulgaria ndash palaeoecological and palaeoclimaticsignificance In PetrovaA (ed) Proceedings of the
VII National Conference on Botany 29ndash30092011 Sofia Bulgarian Botanical SocietySofia 287ndash296 (In Bulgarian)
Ivanov D 2013 Palynological data on the Middle Mio-cene vegetation from Satovcha Basin SW Bul-garia In Țabără D (ed) Ninth Romanian Sym-posium on Paleontology Iași 25ndash26 October 2013Abstract Book University of Iași 62
Lutz H 1997 Taphozoumlnosen terrestrischer Insekten inaquatischen Sedimenten ndash ein Beitrag zur Rekon-struktion des Palaumloenvironments Neues Jahrbuchfuer Geologie und Palaumlontologie Abhandlungen203 173ndash210
Nel A Simov N Bozukov V Marinov M 2016 Newdragonflies and damselflies from Middle Miocenedeposits in SW Bulgaria (Insecta Odonata) Palae-ontologia Electronica 19335A 1ndash13
Selmeier A 1990 Die Molasseflora von Oumlhningen InWeidert WK (ed) Klassische Fundstellen derPalaoumlntologie Band 2 Gold-schneck-VerlagKorb 214ndash220
Simov N Langourov M Pavlova A Hubenov ZBozukov V 2021 First record of fossil Diptera (In-secta) in Miocene deposits in Bulgaria Comptesrendus de lrsquoAcadeacutemie bulgare des Sciences 74 (2)233ndash240httpsdoiorg107546CRABS20210210
Vatsev M Pirumova L 1983 Lithostratigraphy of Ter-tiary sediments from the Satovcha Graben An-nuaire de lrsquoEacutecole supeacuterieure des Mines et de Geacuteo-logie Sofia 2 169ndash179 (In Bulgarian)
Vatsev M 1999 New data about stratigraphy of theNeogene rocks of the South-western RhodopesBulgaria Review of the Bulgarian Geological So-ciety 60 (1ndash3) 127ndash137 (In Bulgarian)
Nikolay Simov Mario Langourov Vladimir Sakalian Vladimir Bozukov
34 Historia naturalis bulgarica 42 (2021)
Nikolay Simov Mario Langourov Vladimir Sakalian Vladimir Bozukov
32 Historia naturalis bulgarica 42 (2021)
Fig 1 Dicercini gen sp indet (Coleoptera Buprestidae) Cat-III-2151 Division of Palaeobotany and Palynology Institute ofBiodiversity and Ecosystem Research Bulgarian Academy of Sciences Sofia Bulgaria Scale = 10 mm
Fig 2 Same apical part of the abdomen with visible apicalpart of the aedeagus Scale = 4 mm
ginated from the lower part of Sivik Formation theirage should be considered as Middle Miocene
Specimens were observed in dry state and photo-graphed with camera Panasonic Lumix FZ82 Allstructures were measured (in mm) as preserved Thefossil specimens are deposited in the collections of theDivision of Palaeobotany and Palynology Institute ofBiodiversity and Ecosystem Research BulgarianAcademy of Sciences (IBER-BAS)
Results and discussion
Systematic palaeontology
Coleoptera Linnaeus 1758Buprestidae Leach 1815Dicercini Gistel 1848gen sp indet (Figs 1ndash2)
Material male Cat-III-2151 (part) Division of Palaeo-botany and Palynology Institute of Biodiversity andEcosystem Research Bulgarian Academy of Sciences(IBER-BAS) Sofia Bulgaria
Description Cat-III-2151 (part) (Fig 1) Medium-to big- sized beetle length 22 mm width 105 mm 21times as long as wide Dorsolaterally embeddedstrongly compressed Body brown to dark brown withdarker parts of the pronotal disk and medial parts of thefirst 23 of ventral terga Head not preserved Pronotumtransverse moderately cordate Pronotum length 86mm and width 105 mm Elytra obliquely truncate athumeri sides then subparallel to mid length arcuate tonear apices and regularly arcuate just before apicesElytra length ca 155 mm width 55 mm lengthwidth
First fossil jewel beetle (Insecta Coleoptera Buprestidae) from Middle Miocene deposits in Bulgaria
33Historia naturalis bulgarica 42 (2021)
= 282 Rather short and wide and finely punctato-stri-ate Hind legs with pale brown to brown femurs anddarker tibia robust hind tibia 5 mm long Last abdom-inal segment with broadly and gently arched apexPartly extruded aedeagus is visible ndash widened in an-terior half narrowed in apical part (Fig 2)
Remarks
The combination of the following features shows thatthe beetle undoubtedly belongs to family Buprestidaebody nearly cylindrical slightly flattened elongate-ovoid cuneiform pronotum irregularly quadrateslightly narrowed in front and elytrae apically acumin-ate (Bellamy amp Volkovitsh 2005) The big size (22mm) glabrous body cordate pronotum small scutel-lum and more or less arcuate and finely punctato-stri-ate elytra suggest it could be placed in the tribe Dicer-cini Last abdominal segment with broadly and gentlyarched apex suggests the specimen is not of Chryso-chroini In general habitus the fossil beetle resemblesmuch more representatives of the genera Lampetis De-jean 1833 or Perotis Dejean 1833 or other DicerciniThe incomplete preservation of the specimen does notallow species description or affiliation to exact genus
The composition of the rich flora (Bozukov 1998a1998b 1999a 1999b 2000) supported the humidwarm-temperate to subtropical climate of this time in-terval (with temperatures above 15ndash16degC and precipit-ation above 1000 mm) with frostless winters while thevegetation corresponds to the mixed mesophytic forest(Ivanov 2012 2013) In terms of floristic compositionthe fossil flora of Satovcha is closest to ldquoevergreenbroadleaved forestrdquo and ldquomixed semi-evergreen forestrdquoof Southeast Asia (Bozukov 2001 2002 Ivanov 20122013) Such conditions correspond well with the cli-matic requirements of the extant representatives of theabove-cited buprestid genera Lampetis and Perotisand Dicercini at all were widely distributed in presenttimes in the tropic-subtropic regions ofAsiaAfrica andboth Americas
The discoveries of first fossil Buprestidae from theMiddle Miocene in Bulgaria is of palaeobiogeograph-ical importance Currently this is one of the oldestMiocene fossil records of Dicercini in Europe A fewdescribed fossil species Perotis bruckmanni Heer1862 P lavateri Heer 1847 Capnodis antiqua Heer1847 C puncticollis Heer 1847 and C spectabilisHeer 1862 originated from the locality of Oumlhningen
(South Germany) with the age assigned to the LateMiocene (Selmeier 1990 Lutz 1997 Fikaacuteček ampSchmied 2013)
Acknowledgements
The authors are greatly indebted to Mark Volkovitsh(Zoological Institute Saint Petersburg) and one an-onymous reviewer for reviews and valuable criticalcomments and remarks
References
Bellamy CL 2008 A World Catalogue and Biblio-graphy of the Jewel Beetles (ColeopteraBuprestoidea) Volume 2 Chrysochroinae Spheno-pterini through Buprestinae Stigmoderini 626ndash1260
Bellamy CL Volkovitsh MG 2005 Chapter 17Buprestoidea Crowson 1955 pp 461ndash468 InBeutel RG Leschen RAB (eds) Handbook ofZoology Volume IV Arthropoda Insecta Part 38Coleoptera Beetles Volume 1 Morphology andSystematics W de Gruyter Berlin New York 567pp
Bozukov V 1998a Miocene macroflora of the SatovchaGraben (Western Rhodopes) I Systematics 1Equisetophyta Polypodiophyta Pinophyta Phyto-logia Balcanica 4 (1ndash2) 3ndash12
Bozukov V 1998b Miocene macroflora of theSatovcha Graben (Western Rhodopes) I System-atics 2 Lauraceae Magnoliaceae Cercidiphylla-ceae Hamamelidaceae Ulmaceae MoraceaePhytologia Balcanica 4 (3) 3ndash12
Bozukov V 1999a Miocene macroflora of the SatovchaGraben (Western Rhodopes) I Systematics 3Fagaceae Betulaceae Phytologia Balcanica 5 (1)3ndash13
Bozukov V 1999b Miocene macroflora of theSatovcha Graben (Western Rhodopes) I System-atics 4 Myricaceae Juglandaceae TheaceaeSalicaceae Ericaceae Myrsinaceae TiliaceaeSterculiaceae Fabaceae Meliaceae Anacardia-ceae Rutaceae Aceraceae Sapindaceae Styra-caceae Cornaceae Phytologia Balcanica 5 (2ndash3)47ndash62
Bozukov V 2000 Miocene macroflora of the SatovchaGraben (Western Rhodopes) I Systematics 5
Magnoliophyta Araliaceae Aquifoliaceae Cela-straceae Rhamnaceae Vitaceae ApocynaceaeCaprifoliaceae Convolvulaceae MacclintockiaSmilacaceae Cyperaceae Sparganiaceae Typha-ceae Phytologia Balcanica 6 (1) 15ndash29
Bozukov V 2001 Miocene macroflora of the SatovchaGraben (Western Rhodopes) II Paleofloristic pa-leoecological and phytogeographical analysisPhytologia Balcanica 7 (1) 13ndash33
Bozukov V 2002 Miocene macroflara of the SatovchaGraben (Western Rhodopes) III Comparative ana-lysis of the Satovcha paleoflora with benchmarkEuropean macrofloras Geological age of the pa-leoflora Phytologia Balcanica 8 (2) 165ndash180
Fikaacuteček M Schmied H 2013 Insect Fauna of the LateMiocene Locality of Oumlhningen (Germany) LessDiverse Than Reported An Example of the Hydro-philid Beetles (Coleoptera) Journal of Paleonto-logy 87 (3) 427ndash443
Heer O 1847 Die Insektenfauna der Tertiaumlrgebilde vonOeningen und von Radoboj in Croatien ErsterTheil Kaumlfer 229 pp
Heer O 1862 Beitraumlge zur Insektenfauna OeningensColeoptera Geodephagen HydrocantharidenGyriniden Brachelytren Clavicornen Lamelli-cornen und Buprestiden Natuurkundige Verhan-delingen van de Hollandsche Maatschappij derWetenschappen te Haarlem 16 (2) 1ndash90
Ivanov D 2004 Pollen of some exotic plants in theNeogene of Bulgaria Acta Palaeobotanica 44 (1)69ndash77
Ivanov D 2012 New palynological data on some sub-tropical floristic elements of the Middle Mioceneof Bulgaria ndash palaeoecological and palaeoclimaticsignificance In PetrovaA (ed) Proceedings of the
VII National Conference on Botany 29ndash30092011 Sofia Bulgarian Botanical SocietySofia 287ndash296 (In Bulgarian)
Ivanov D 2013 Palynological data on the Middle Mio-cene vegetation from Satovcha Basin SW Bul-garia In Țabără D (ed) Ninth Romanian Sym-posium on Paleontology Iași 25ndash26 October 2013Abstract Book University of Iași 62
Lutz H 1997 Taphozoumlnosen terrestrischer Insekten inaquatischen Sedimenten ndash ein Beitrag zur Rekon-struktion des Palaumloenvironments Neues Jahrbuchfuer Geologie und Palaumlontologie Abhandlungen203 173ndash210
Nel A Simov N Bozukov V Marinov M 2016 Newdragonflies and damselflies from Middle Miocenedeposits in SW Bulgaria (Insecta Odonata) Palae-ontologia Electronica 19335A 1ndash13
Selmeier A 1990 Die Molasseflora von Oumlhningen InWeidert WK (ed) Klassische Fundstellen derPalaoumlntologie Band 2 Gold-schneck-VerlagKorb 214ndash220
Simov N Langourov M Pavlova A Hubenov ZBozukov V 2021 First record of fossil Diptera (In-secta) in Miocene deposits in Bulgaria Comptesrendus de lrsquoAcadeacutemie bulgare des Sciences 74 (2)233ndash240httpsdoiorg107546CRABS20210210
Vatsev M Pirumova L 1983 Lithostratigraphy of Ter-tiary sediments from the Satovcha Graben An-nuaire de lrsquoEacutecole supeacuterieure des Mines et de Geacuteo-logie Sofia 2 169ndash179 (In Bulgarian)
Vatsev M 1999 New data about stratigraphy of theNeogene rocks of the South-western RhodopesBulgaria Review of the Bulgarian Geological So-ciety 60 (1ndash3) 127ndash137 (In Bulgarian)
Nikolay Simov Mario Langourov Vladimir Sakalian Vladimir Bozukov
34 Historia naturalis bulgarica 42 (2021)
First fossil jewel beetle (Insecta Coleoptera Buprestidae) from Middle Miocene deposits in Bulgaria
33Historia naturalis bulgarica 42 (2021)
= 282 Rather short and wide and finely punctato-stri-ate Hind legs with pale brown to brown femurs anddarker tibia robust hind tibia 5 mm long Last abdom-inal segment with broadly and gently arched apexPartly extruded aedeagus is visible ndash widened in an-terior half narrowed in apical part (Fig 2)
Remarks
The combination of the following features shows thatthe beetle undoubtedly belongs to family Buprestidaebody nearly cylindrical slightly flattened elongate-ovoid cuneiform pronotum irregularly quadrateslightly narrowed in front and elytrae apically acumin-ate (Bellamy amp Volkovitsh 2005) The big size (22mm) glabrous body cordate pronotum small scutel-lum and more or less arcuate and finely punctato-stri-ate elytra suggest it could be placed in the tribe Dicer-cini Last abdominal segment with broadly and gentlyarched apex suggests the specimen is not of Chryso-chroini In general habitus the fossil beetle resemblesmuch more representatives of the genera Lampetis De-jean 1833 or Perotis Dejean 1833 or other DicerciniThe incomplete preservation of the specimen does notallow species description or affiliation to exact genus
The composition of the rich flora (Bozukov 1998a1998b 1999a 1999b 2000) supported the humidwarm-temperate to subtropical climate of this time in-terval (with temperatures above 15ndash16degC and precipit-ation above 1000 mm) with frostless winters while thevegetation corresponds to the mixed mesophytic forest(Ivanov 2012 2013) In terms of floristic compositionthe fossil flora of Satovcha is closest to ldquoevergreenbroadleaved forestrdquo and ldquomixed semi-evergreen forestrdquoof Southeast Asia (Bozukov 2001 2002 Ivanov 20122013) Such conditions correspond well with the cli-matic requirements of the extant representatives of theabove-cited buprestid genera Lampetis and Perotisand Dicercini at all were widely distributed in presenttimes in the tropic-subtropic regions ofAsiaAfrica andboth Americas
The discoveries of first fossil Buprestidae from theMiddle Miocene in Bulgaria is of palaeobiogeograph-ical importance Currently this is one of the oldestMiocene fossil records of Dicercini in Europe A fewdescribed fossil species Perotis bruckmanni Heer1862 P lavateri Heer 1847 Capnodis antiqua Heer1847 C puncticollis Heer 1847 and C spectabilisHeer 1862 originated from the locality of Oumlhningen
(South Germany) with the age assigned to the LateMiocene (Selmeier 1990 Lutz 1997 Fikaacuteček ampSchmied 2013)
Acknowledgements
The authors are greatly indebted to Mark Volkovitsh(Zoological Institute Saint Petersburg) and one an-onymous reviewer for reviews and valuable criticalcomments and remarks
References
Bellamy CL 2008 A World Catalogue and Biblio-graphy of the Jewel Beetles (ColeopteraBuprestoidea) Volume 2 Chrysochroinae Spheno-pterini through Buprestinae Stigmoderini 626ndash1260
Bellamy CL Volkovitsh MG 2005 Chapter 17Buprestoidea Crowson 1955 pp 461ndash468 InBeutel RG Leschen RAB (eds) Handbook ofZoology Volume IV Arthropoda Insecta Part 38Coleoptera Beetles Volume 1 Morphology andSystematics W de Gruyter Berlin New York 567pp
Bozukov V 1998a Miocene macroflora of the SatovchaGraben (Western Rhodopes) I Systematics 1Equisetophyta Polypodiophyta Pinophyta Phyto-logia Balcanica 4 (1ndash2) 3ndash12
Bozukov V 1998b Miocene macroflora of theSatovcha Graben (Western Rhodopes) I System-atics 2 Lauraceae Magnoliaceae Cercidiphylla-ceae Hamamelidaceae Ulmaceae MoraceaePhytologia Balcanica 4 (3) 3ndash12
Bozukov V 1999a Miocene macroflora of the SatovchaGraben (Western Rhodopes) I Systematics 3Fagaceae Betulaceae Phytologia Balcanica 5 (1)3ndash13
Bozukov V 1999b Miocene macroflora of theSatovcha Graben (Western Rhodopes) I System-atics 4 Myricaceae Juglandaceae TheaceaeSalicaceae Ericaceae Myrsinaceae TiliaceaeSterculiaceae Fabaceae Meliaceae Anacardia-ceae Rutaceae Aceraceae Sapindaceae Styra-caceae Cornaceae Phytologia Balcanica 5 (2ndash3)47ndash62
Bozukov V 2000 Miocene macroflora of the SatovchaGraben (Western Rhodopes) I Systematics 5
Magnoliophyta Araliaceae Aquifoliaceae Cela-straceae Rhamnaceae Vitaceae ApocynaceaeCaprifoliaceae Convolvulaceae MacclintockiaSmilacaceae Cyperaceae Sparganiaceae Typha-ceae Phytologia Balcanica 6 (1) 15ndash29
Bozukov V 2001 Miocene macroflora of the SatovchaGraben (Western Rhodopes) II Paleofloristic pa-leoecological and phytogeographical analysisPhytologia Balcanica 7 (1) 13ndash33
Bozukov V 2002 Miocene macroflara of the SatovchaGraben (Western Rhodopes) III Comparative ana-lysis of the Satovcha paleoflora with benchmarkEuropean macrofloras Geological age of the pa-leoflora Phytologia Balcanica 8 (2) 165ndash180
Fikaacuteček M Schmied H 2013 Insect Fauna of the LateMiocene Locality of Oumlhningen (Germany) LessDiverse Than Reported An Example of the Hydro-philid Beetles (Coleoptera) Journal of Paleonto-logy 87 (3) 427ndash443
Heer O 1847 Die Insektenfauna der Tertiaumlrgebilde vonOeningen und von Radoboj in Croatien ErsterTheil Kaumlfer 229 pp
Heer O 1862 Beitraumlge zur Insektenfauna OeningensColeoptera Geodephagen HydrocantharidenGyriniden Brachelytren Clavicornen Lamelli-cornen und Buprestiden Natuurkundige Verhan-delingen van de Hollandsche Maatschappij derWetenschappen te Haarlem 16 (2) 1ndash90
Ivanov D 2004 Pollen of some exotic plants in theNeogene of Bulgaria Acta Palaeobotanica 44 (1)69ndash77
Ivanov D 2012 New palynological data on some sub-tropical floristic elements of the Middle Mioceneof Bulgaria ndash palaeoecological and palaeoclimaticsignificance In PetrovaA (ed) Proceedings of the
VII National Conference on Botany 29ndash30092011 Sofia Bulgarian Botanical SocietySofia 287ndash296 (In Bulgarian)
Ivanov D 2013 Palynological data on the Middle Mio-cene vegetation from Satovcha Basin SW Bul-garia In Țabără D (ed) Ninth Romanian Sym-posium on Paleontology Iași 25ndash26 October 2013Abstract Book University of Iași 62
Lutz H 1997 Taphozoumlnosen terrestrischer Insekten inaquatischen Sedimenten ndash ein Beitrag zur Rekon-struktion des Palaumloenvironments Neues Jahrbuchfuer Geologie und Palaumlontologie Abhandlungen203 173ndash210
Nel A Simov N Bozukov V Marinov M 2016 Newdragonflies and damselflies from Middle Miocenedeposits in SW Bulgaria (Insecta Odonata) Palae-ontologia Electronica 19335A 1ndash13
Selmeier A 1990 Die Molasseflora von Oumlhningen InWeidert WK (ed) Klassische Fundstellen derPalaoumlntologie Band 2 Gold-schneck-VerlagKorb 214ndash220
Simov N Langourov M Pavlova A Hubenov ZBozukov V 2021 First record of fossil Diptera (In-secta) in Miocene deposits in Bulgaria Comptesrendus de lrsquoAcadeacutemie bulgare des Sciences 74 (2)233ndash240httpsdoiorg107546CRABS20210210
Vatsev M Pirumova L 1983 Lithostratigraphy of Ter-tiary sediments from the Satovcha Graben An-nuaire de lrsquoEacutecole supeacuterieure des Mines et de Geacuteo-logie Sofia 2 169ndash179 (In Bulgarian)
Vatsev M 1999 New data about stratigraphy of theNeogene rocks of the South-western RhodopesBulgaria Review of the Bulgarian Geological So-ciety 60 (1ndash3) 127ndash137 (In Bulgarian)
Nikolay Simov Mario Langourov Vladimir Sakalian Vladimir Bozukov
34 Historia naturalis bulgarica 42 (2021)
Magnoliophyta Araliaceae Aquifoliaceae Cela-straceae Rhamnaceae Vitaceae ApocynaceaeCaprifoliaceae Convolvulaceae MacclintockiaSmilacaceae Cyperaceae Sparganiaceae Typha-ceae Phytologia Balcanica 6 (1) 15ndash29
Bozukov V 2001 Miocene macroflora of the SatovchaGraben (Western Rhodopes) II Paleofloristic pa-leoecological and phytogeographical analysisPhytologia Balcanica 7 (1) 13ndash33
Bozukov V 2002 Miocene macroflara of the SatovchaGraben (Western Rhodopes) III Comparative ana-lysis of the Satovcha paleoflora with benchmarkEuropean macrofloras Geological age of the pa-leoflora Phytologia Balcanica 8 (2) 165ndash180
Fikaacuteček M Schmied H 2013 Insect Fauna of the LateMiocene Locality of Oumlhningen (Germany) LessDiverse Than Reported An Example of the Hydro-philid Beetles (Coleoptera) Journal of Paleonto-logy 87 (3) 427ndash443
Heer O 1847 Die Insektenfauna der Tertiaumlrgebilde vonOeningen und von Radoboj in Croatien ErsterTheil Kaumlfer 229 pp
Heer O 1862 Beitraumlge zur Insektenfauna OeningensColeoptera Geodephagen HydrocantharidenGyriniden Brachelytren Clavicornen Lamelli-cornen und Buprestiden Natuurkundige Verhan-delingen van de Hollandsche Maatschappij derWetenschappen te Haarlem 16 (2) 1ndash90
Ivanov D 2004 Pollen of some exotic plants in theNeogene of Bulgaria Acta Palaeobotanica 44 (1)69ndash77
Ivanov D 2012 New palynological data on some sub-tropical floristic elements of the Middle Mioceneof Bulgaria ndash palaeoecological and palaeoclimaticsignificance In PetrovaA (ed) Proceedings of the
VII National Conference on Botany 29ndash30092011 Sofia Bulgarian Botanical SocietySofia 287ndash296 (In Bulgarian)
Ivanov D 2013 Palynological data on the Middle Mio-cene vegetation from Satovcha Basin SW Bul-garia In Țabără D (ed) Ninth Romanian Sym-posium on Paleontology Iași 25ndash26 October 2013Abstract Book University of Iași 62
Lutz H 1997 Taphozoumlnosen terrestrischer Insekten inaquatischen Sedimenten ndash ein Beitrag zur Rekon-struktion des Palaumloenvironments Neues Jahrbuchfuer Geologie und Palaumlontologie Abhandlungen203 173ndash210
Nel A Simov N Bozukov V Marinov M 2016 Newdragonflies and damselflies from Middle Miocenedeposits in SW Bulgaria (Insecta Odonata) Palae-ontologia Electronica 19335A 1ndash13
Selmeier A 1990 Die Molasseflora von Oumlhningen InWeidert WK (ed) Klassische Fundstellen derPalaoumlntologie Band 2 Gold-schneck-VerlagKorb 214ndash220
Simov N Langourov M Pavlova A Hubenov ZBozukov V 2021 First record of fossil Diptera (In-secta) in Miocene deposits in Bulgaria Comptesrendus de lrsquoAcadeacutemie bulgare des Sciences 74 (2)233ndash240httpsdoiorg107546CRABS20210210
Vatsev M Pirumova L 1983 Lithostratigraphy of Ter-tiary sediments from the Satovcha Graben An-nuaire de lrsquoEacutecole supeacuterieure des Mines et de Geacuteo-logie Sofia 2 169ndash179 (In Bulgarian)
Vatsev M 1999 New data about stratigraphy of theNeogene rocks of the South-western RhodopesBulgaria Review of the Bulgarian Geological So-ciety 60 (1ndash3) 127ndash137 (In Bulgarian)
Nikolay Simov Mario Langourov Vladimir Sakalian Vladimir Bozukov
34 Historia naturalis bulgarica 42 (2021)