VERTEBRATE PALEONTOLOGY IN 1909 659 



grow from persistent pulps, but that their enamel is restricted 

 to the lower and outer surface and that the point is worn off 

 obliquely. Unfortunately, the tip of the upper jaw is broken 

 off and, at first sight, it seems natural to infer that the pre- 

 maxillae carried a pair of rodent-like upper incisors. How to 

 account otherwise for the wearing away of the summits of the 

 permanently-growing lower incisors is indeed a difficult matter, 

 but the reacquisition of a lost tooth appears to be a phenomenon 

 unknown. As regards the rest of its skeleton, Myotragus is 

 characterised by the extreme shortness of the cannon-bones 

 of both fore and hind limbs— an abbreviation considerably in 

 excess of that which occurs in either the musk-ox or the takin. 

 As to the date at which this " rodent goat " became exter- 

 minated, there is no clue. Miss Bate's paper is published in 

 the Geological Magazine for 1909. 



Another discovery of ruminant remains in the Mediterranean 

 Islands — this time Crete — likewise demands brief mention. As 

 recorded in the Vierteljahrsschrift der Naturforschenden Gcsell- 

 schaft in Zurich, vol. liv. p. 424, Dr. C. Keller has recently 

 discovered in the ruins of the palace of King Minos at Knossus 

 remains of the aurochs, or extinct wild-ox (Bos taunts primi- 

 geuius), which he regards as explaining the myth of the 

 minotaur and the labyrinth. The labyrinth has been shown 

 to be the royal palace and the minotaur, it is now suggested, 

 was neither more nor less than the aurochs which was captured 

 half-tamed, and exhibited in the arena. 



Remains of the aurochs and of the bison preserved at 

 Stuttgart form the basis of a paper on those animals by Dr. 

 Max Hilzheimer, published in No. 66 of Mitteilungen aus dem 

 Kgl. Naturalienkabinett zu Stuttgart. In the author's opinion, 

 the modern bison (Bos bonasus) and the Pleistocene B. priscus 

 lived side by side in Europe and it is suggested that the latter, 

 together with the existing bison of the Caucasus, is more nearly 

 related to the American than to the typical Lithuanian bison. 

 In confirmation of the contemporary existence of bonasus and 

 priscus prehistoric sketches apparently indicative of two 

 distinct types of bison are cited. A fossil bison from Siberia 

 (B. primitivus) is regarded as the most generalised member of 

 the group, its skull showing a larger intrusion of the parietals 

 on to the frontal aspect than in any of the other forms. A paper 

 on remains of aurochs and bison in the Dantzic Museum has 



