MATTHEW, CLIMATE AND EVOLUTION 



255 



boscidea have not, however, been found either in Europe or North Amer- 

 ica but have been recognized in the Oligocene of Egypt. From this fact, 

 it has been generally concluded that the Proboscidea first evolved in the 

 Ethiopian region. But it should be remembered that northern Egypt is 

 not strictly within the Ethiopian region but belongs with all of northern 

 Africa to the Mediterranean subregion of Holarctica. Owing to its prox- 

 imity to the Ethiopian region, it contains Ethiopian elements in its mod- 

 ern fauna and may have contained more in the past. But it is not clear 

 that the Oligocene Proboscidea must be numbered among these. There 

 is no evidence that their center of dispersal was not Asiatic in early as in 

 later Tertiary ;^^ but it must have been too far to the south to admit of 

 their reaching Europe or North America, until after their spread into 

 northeast Africa. We must therefore conclude, apparently, that the dis- 

 persal center was transferred to the north and east during the course of 

 the Tertiary — a quite exceptional feature, beside which the question of 

 its original location, whether in southern Asia or in Africa, appears much 

 less important. 



Table XV. — Distribution of the Proboscidea 



*" Certainly the Proboscidea of the Oligocene Gaj fauna of India are far more ad- 

 vanced than the Egyptian Fayflm genera, if Pilgrim's correlation of the Gaj beds Is cor- 

 rect. This, by our methods of interpretation, would indicate that India was much 

 nearer than Egypt to the dispersal center. 



