Becklesia maulnyi sp. nov.: A new cycadean species from the Lower Oxfordian (Upper Jurassic) of Écommoy (Sarthe, NW France)

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• 作者：Matthieu Le Couls^a ; ^{matthieu.lecouls@univ-rennes1.fr" class="auth_mail" title="E-mail the corresponding author} ; Jason Hilton^b ; Franç ; ois Guillocheau^a ; Nicolas Morel^c ; Philippe Courville^a
• 关键词：Cycads ; Becklesia ; Oxfordian ; Upper Jurassic ; Sarthe ; NW France
• 刊名：Annales de Paleontologie
• 出版年：2016
• 出版时间：April-June 2016
• 年：2016
• 卷：102
• 期：2
• 页码：95-101
• 全文大小：2572 K

文摘

Plant macrofossil remains of Becklesia Seward, 1895 emend. Watson and Cusack, 2005, a rare genus of extinct cycad, have been known for over a century from Great Britain and Libya. Historically the genus was poorly characterized leading to many fossil cycads that resembled Becklesia being placed in other genera including Cycadites and Paracycas. We describe here a new species, B. maulnyi sp. nov., from an exceptional and almost complete cycad specimen housed for two hundred years in the collections of the Musée Vert of Le Mans. The specimen comprises the apex of a stem bearing petiolate and pinnate leaves with thin and widely separated leaflets, which possess two prominent abaxial stomatal grooves that are characteristic of the genus Becklesia. We reassign three other French cycad fossils previously described under different generic names to Becklesia. Finally, we briefly discuss the geographical and stratigraphical implications of the genus and also consider presence of entire cycads in the fossil record.