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GEOLOGIG AL MAGAZINE; 



NE.W SERIES. DECADE V. VOL. I. 



No. XI.— NOVEMBER, 1904. 



o:RX<3rXi<rj^Xj jLiaTiCLEis. 



I. — Note on the Gigantic Land Tortoise {Testudo Asimon, 

 Andrews), from the Upper Eocene of Egypt. 



By C. "W. Andrews, D.Sc, F.G.S., British Museum (Natoal History). 

 (PLATE XVII.) 



IN the course of his excavations in the Upper Eocene beds of the 

 Fayum during the early part of 1902, Mr. H. J. L. Beadnell 

 unearthed a remarkably fine shell of a very large species of Testudo. 

 A brief description of this specimen ^ was afterwards published in 

 Cairo by the present writer, and it was made the type of a new 

 species, Testudo Ammon. At the same time Mr. Beadnell gave 

 a short account of the beds in which it was found, and of the 

 methods employed by him for its preservation and transport to 

 the Museum in Cairo. 



Owing to the fact that when the original description was drawn 

 up the shell was still imperfectly freed from matrix, some mistakes 

 were made, the most important being the statement that there was 

 no epidermal nuchal shield. It can now be seen that this was 

 present, though it happens that in the type-specimen it is smaller 

 and less distinctly marked than in other shells since found, including 

 several specimens in Cairo and two in the British Museum. 



Plate XVII is a side view of the type-specimen, and the diagram in 

 the text (p. 528) shows the structure of the carapace in this species. 

 Seen from above, the shell is somewhat quadrate in outline, owing 

 to the prominence of the slightly everted antero-lateral and postero- 

 lateral portions of the border.. The carapace is strongly arched, 

 and the vertebral shields form prominent bosses, separated from 

 one another and from the costals by deep depressions ; the costals 

 themselves are also somewhat convex. The anterior border of the 

 carapace is slightly emarginate, and there was an epidermal nuchal 

 shield. There are seven neural bones and three pygals ; the latter 

 form a protective covering for the tail and project below the level 



^ " A Preliminary Notice of a Land Tortoise from the Upper Eocene of the 

 Fayum, Egypt," by C: W. Andrews and H. J. L. Beadnell, Survey Department, 

 Cairo, IQOo! 



DECADE V. VOL. I. NO. XI. 31 



