Brief Survey of the Affinities and Histciry of the Oyprian Flora. 335 



is probably, at any rate in sri'eat part, just owing to tlie existence of this arm of sea in the Pliocene epoch; 

 it must, however, in this connection be remembered that eastern North-Africa has only quite insignificant 

 mountain-tracts, and that, therefore, it is mainly the lowland-flora of Cyprus which may bo compared with 

 that of North-Africa. 



To this period, when the island was contiguous to the continent, should probably also be ascribed 

 the immigration of most of its living and extinct mammals, among these Hippopotamus minutua and Elephat 

 Cypriotes (compare p. 8), and moreover a great part of the other land- and freshwater-fauna. 



To judge from the geological investigations at hand, already before the end of the Pliocene epoch 

 the contiguity of the island with the continent was probably broken. iSince that time Cyprus has, so far 

 as we know, permanently remained an island, and in the course of the subsequent periods its vegetation 

 has gradually attained its present characteristics. Plant-species, which did not reach the coasts, facing 

 the island, till the connection of land was broken, have not aftei- tliat time had so easy an access to the 

 island. Through this we shall fiequently be able to explain the circumstance, that plants which at present 

 are common in the nearests countries on the continent are totally absent on Cyprus. Certain plants, 

 which seem now to be wanting on the island, have, however, undoubtedly grown there in former times, 

 e. g. one or more species of the genus Acanthus (compare p. 169 and 202). During the space of time in 

 which Cyprus has existed as an isolated island, a great share of the endemical plants of the island must 

 be supposed to have developed. Positive reasons for assuming this, however, only exist in regard to such 

 species which have close allies among the non-endemical plants of the island itself, or in any case in the 

 nearest countries. On Cyprus, however, also several endemical plants are found, the closest allies of which 

 grow in rather remote countries (compare p. 329 — 330), and with regard to these — or at any rate to the 

 majority of them — it seems more natural to suppose, that they are survived representatives of form-groups, 

 which have formerly, especially in the Pliocene period, had a far more cohesive distribution than they have 

 at present. As an instance of such a species Bosea cypria may be mentioned. 



The moister climate of the Pluvial epoch, which has left such distinct traces in the geological 

 history of the eastern Meditei'ranean countries, has beyond doubt been of great importance for the deve- 

 lopment also of the flora of Cyprus. The old deposits of calcareous tufa at Kazan near to the village of 

 Agiidhi must in all probability be reckoned just to this period, and this will also most probably prove 

 to be the case with the tufa-beds at Lapithos (compare p. 198). These mighty deposits of calcareous tufa 

 imply the existence of a considerably moister climate than the present one at the time when their forma- 

 tion took place, and they show that such foliferous trees as Platanus, Ficus and Laurus have once 

 grown in places which are now too dry for the thriving of these trees. It is most probable, that besides 

 these trees also other relatively moisture-loving plants have at the same time had a far greater distribu- 

 tion on the island than they have at present; very likely the immigration of many of them just then 

 took place. When the climate again became drier, they have been pushed back to moist river-shores, 

 to the nearest surroundings of the brooks, to shady valley-clefts and similar places, where they are 

 best protected against exsiccation. Although I, in the short time which I had at my disposal for the study 

 of the tufa-beds, did not succeed in finding remains of plants which are now wanting on the island, very 

 likely, judging from the experiences made in neighbouring tracts (f. inst. on the island of Skyros in the 

 Aegean'), Cyprus may at that time have possessed plants which later on have become extinct here. It 

 would be highly desirable if future explorers would direct their attention to this question and make the 

 plant-containing tufa-beds of the island subject of more complete investigations than I had the opportunity 

 of making. The Pluvial epoch must, in any case, have been very favourable to the spreading of numerous 

 moisture-loving plants within the Mediterranean region; the fact that Cyprus seems to have been separated 

 from the continent already before the commencement of the Pluvial epoch, may explain the absence in 

 the flora of the island of so many otherwise common hydrophile and mesophiie species. 



1) Compare p. 332. 



