The European Eocene adapiforms include two subfamilies, the Cercamoniinae, present in the early and middle Eocene, and the Adapinae, present in the late Eocene (Franzen, 1994; Godinot, 1998; Fleagle, 1999; Gebo, 2002). The large adapine species has a robust upper canine and other characters. It was named Adapis magnus by Filhol (1874), and was later placed in the genus Leptadapis by Gervais (1876). However, Gervais’ choice was seldom followed by subsequent authors. Stehlin (1912) and Depéret (1917), for example, retained Leptadapis as a subgenus of Adapis. For Stehlin, a fossil species was equivalent to a living genus; he used the name Adapis magnus in his text and figures, and Leptadapis magnus in his final stratigraphic chart of the genus Adapis (p. 1280). A single genus, Adapis, is used by Genet-Varcin (1963), Simons (1972), and Gingerich (1977, 1981). Most recent authors (Godinot, 1998; Fleagle, 1999; Gebo, 2002) kept the genus Leptadapis, following Szalay and Delson (1979). Recent work by Lanèque emphasized the systematic complexity reflected by the skulls of Adapis sensu Szalay and Delson (1979) (Lanèque, 1992a, b, 1993), and also showed a marked heterogeneity in the larger adapine skulls (Leptadapis) (Lanèque, 1993). The radiation of these adapines is very complex (Godinot, 1998); there is an overlap in size between the large Adapis and the small Leptadapis. Furthermore, the dentally peculiar Cryptadapis (Godinot, 1984) lies in this zone of overlap. Deciphering the systematics and the phylogeny of the adapines is a longterm task.
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Godinot, M., Couette, S. (2008). Morphological Diversity in the Skulls of Large Adapines (Primates, Adapiformes) and Its Systematic Implications. In: Sargis, E.J., Dagosto, M. (eds) Mammalian Evolutionary Morphology. Vertebrate Paleobiology and Paleoanthropology Series. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4020-6997-0_12
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