''Praepusa'' is an extinct genus of

earless seal The earless seals, phocids or true seals are one of the three main groups of mammals within the seal lineage, Pinnipedia. All true seals are members of the family Phocidae (). They are sometimes called crawling seals to distinguish them from th ...

s from Neogene marine deposits in Europe. Five species, ''P. boeska,'' ''P. magyaricus'', ''P. pannonica'', ''P. tarchankutica'' and ''P. vindoboensis'', are known.

Description

''Praepusa'''s occipital bones possess well-developed jugular processes. The canine teeth are developed, and the

molars The molars or molar teeth are large, flat teeth at the back of the mouth. They are more developed in mammals. They are used primarily to grind food during chewing. The name ''molar'' derives from Latin, ''molaris dens'', meaning "millstone to ...

are predominantly tricuspid in form, and, like the

premolars The premolars, also called premolar teeth, or bicuspids, are transitional teeth located between the canine and molar teeth. In humans, there are two premolars per quadrant in the permanent set of teeth, making eight premolars total in the mouth ...

, are packed closely together. The mandible as a whole is small and thin, with a symphyseal portion that is bluntly rounded, and the chin is most prominent between premolars 3–4. The facial part of the skull is relatively low and shortened, and the mandible is more compact. The deltoid crest of the humerus is sharp, with maximal distention at its

proximal Standard anatomical terms of location are used to unambiguously describe the anatomy of animals, including humans. The terms, typically derived from Latin or Greek roots, describe something in its standard anatomical position. This position pro ...

end. The trochanteric fossa of the femur is wide and medially open, though deep.

Taxonomy

There are five recognized species of ''Praepusa''. ''P. boeska'', known from

Pliocene The Pliocene ( ; also Pleiocene) is the epoch in the geologic time scale that extends from 5.333 million to 2.58Pusa ''Pusa'' is a genus of the earless seals, within the family Phocidae. The three species of this genus were split from the genus ''Phoca'', and some sources still give ''Phoca'' as an acceptable synonym for ''Pusa''. The three species in this ge ...

''. The other species include ''P. magyaricus'', found in

Serravallian The Serravallian is, in the geologic timescale, an List of time periods, age or a stage (stratigraphy), stage in the middle Miocene epoch (geology), Epoch/series (stratigraphy), Series, which spans the time between 13.82 annum, Ma and 11.63 Ma (m ...

-age deposits in Hungary,I. A. Koretsky. 2003
New finds of Sarmatian seals (Mammalia, Carnivora, Phocinae) from southern Hungary.
Advances in Vertebrate Paleontology "Hen to Panta" 63-70. ''P. pannonica'', known from Miocene marine deposits in the eastern

Paratethys The Paratethys sea, Paratethys ocean, Paratethys realm or just Paratethys was a large shallow inland sea that stretched from the region north of the Alps over Central Europe to the Aral Sea in Central Asia. Paratethys was peculiar due to its pa ...

, ''P. tarchankutica'', known from the

Miocene The Miocene ( ) is the first geological epoch of the Neogene Period and extends from about (Ma). The Miocene was named by Scottish geologist Charles Lyell; the name comes from the Greek words (', "less") and (', "new") and means "less recen ...

of Ukraine,A. A. Antoniuk and I. A. Koretsky. 1984. A new seal species from the middle Sarmatian deposits of the Crimean district of Ukraine. Vestnik Zoologii 1984(4):26-31 and ''P. vindobonensis'', known from Miocene marine deposits in central and eastern Europe.Toula, F (1897). "Phoca vindobonensis n. sp. von Nussdorf in Wien // Beiträge zur Paläontologie und Geologie Öster-reich-Ungarns und des Orients." ''Mittheilungen des Paläontologischen Instituts der Universität Wien.'' 41: 47–70.

References

Miocene pinnipeds Phocines Prehistoric carnivoran genera Prehistoric pinnipeds of Europe Miocene mammals of Europe Fossil taxa described in 1941 {{Paleo-carnivora-stub