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The history of lions in Europe is part of the wider history of the lion species complex. The rediscovery and confirmation of their presence in Europe, already known by myths, historical accounts and ancient art, was made possible by the finds of fossils of Pleistocene, Holocene and Ancient lions excavated in Europe since the early 19th century.
The oldest widely accepted fossils of P. fossilis in Europe date to around 700,000 years ago, such as that from Pakefield in England, [20] [21] [3] [22] with possible older fossils from Western Siberia dating to the late Early Pleistocene, [23] with a 2024 study suggesting a presence in Spain by 1 million years ago. [24]
This cat entered Eurasia about 780,000–700,000 years ago and gave rise to several lion-like forms. The first fossils that can be definitively classified as P. fossilis date to circa 660,000–612,000 years ago. [3] Possibly earlier records of P. fossilis. are known from the late Early Pleistocene (over 780,000 years ago) of Western Siberia. [10]
Panthera gombaszoegensis, also known as the European jaguar, is a Panthera species that lived from about 2.0 to 0.35 million years ago in Europe, as well as likely elsewhere in Eurasia. [1] The first fossils were excavated in 1938 in Gombasek Cave , Slovakia . [ 2 ]
Panthera uncia pyrenaica, or Panthera pyrenaica, is an extinct pantherine felid that lived during the Middle Pleistocene in southern France.This taxon was initially suggested to be an European paleosubspecies of the modern snow leopard, but subsequently it has been assigned as a separate species within the genus Panthera.
Panthera spelaea lived in Europe after the third Cromerian interglacial stage from about 450,000 to 14,000 years ago. [13] Panthera atrox lived in North America during the Pleistocene and early Holocene about 340,000 to 11,000 years ago. [14] Panthera shawi was a lion-like cat in South Africa that possibly lived in the early Pleistocene. [15]
The site is important for many reasons, including the degree of preservation of ancient land surfaces, the impressive total extent of the palaeolandscape beyond the quarries (over 26 km wide), its huge quantity of well-preserved animal bones, its numerous flint artifacts, and its hominin fossils that are among some of the most ancient found yet in Europe.
As of 2016 the entrance to the cave system leads through La Garma A, [4] as the only entrance into the cave system. [1] It lies at 80 m (262 ft) above sea level and has an extensive stratigraphy, containing Aurignacian, Gravettian, Solutrean, and Magdalenian layers, as well as Mesolithic, Neolithic, Chalcolithic, Bronze Age, and Middle Ages layers.