Further insight into an unnamed, medium-sized crouzeliid pliopithecoid from the Vallès-Penedès Basin (NE Iberian Peninsula)

Abstract Pliopithecoids are a clade of stem catarrhines represented by multiple Middle to Late Miocene genera in the Vallès-Penedès Basin (NE Iberian Peninsula). The recent description of the crouzeliid Fanchangia (Early Miocene, China) and the recognition that Pliobates (Late Miocene, Spain) is a crouzeliid enable to revisit the taxonomic affinities of some pliopithecoid remains from this basin, namely an M2 from Trinxera del Ferrocarril-Sant Quirze (SQ-TF; ~11.6–11.2 Ma), generally interpreted as a pliopithecid, and a dP4 from Can Feliu 2 (CF2; <11.2 Ma), previously considered a crouzeliid. We redescribe these remains based on both external morphology and enamel-dentine junction (EDJ), and compare them with those of other pliopithecoids. A cladistic analysis of dental features is performed using a dental matrix that includes the dP4 position, while the M2 EDJ shape is compared using landmark-based three-dimensional geometric morphometric (3DGM) analysis. Finally, body mass is estimated based on M2 size using available allometric equations. Our qualitative comparisons show that the M2 resembles in some regards the Asian anapithecines Laccopithecus and Fanchangia but is less derived than Anapithecus, while the 3DGM analysis supports its crouzeliid affinities and hints at differences from crouzeliines. In turn, the dP4 resembles that of crouzeliids, including the anapithecine Fanchangia and the crouzeliines Pliobates and Crouzelia. Given size congruence and close geographic and temporal proximity, it is likely that both specimens belong to a single, medium-sized crouzeliid species. A cladistic analysis of the two specimens simultaneously supports a sister-taxon relationship with Fanchangia within anapithecine crouzeliids. We conclude that the remains from SQ-TF and CF2 belong to the Crouzeliidae and, likely, to a medium-sized anapithecine. Given the scarcity of the material, we refrain from erecting a new species and provisionally refer to this taxon as Anapithecinae nov.—in the hope that future fieldwork will eventually recover additional, more complete material.