Comments: | Prometheomyini. The only extant member of an archaic line that most specialists isolate as a tribe within Arvicolinae (Gromov and Polyakov, 1977; Hooper and Hart, 1962; Kretzoi, 1955, 1969; McKenna and Bell, 1997; Musser and Carleton, 1993; Pavlinov and Rossolimo, 1987; Zagorodnyuk, 1990). Repenning et al. (1990), however, aligned Prometheomys with another presumed relic, Ellobius, in Prometheomyinae. A third view was offered by Pavlinov et al. (1995a) and Pavlinov and Rossolimo (1998), who sequestered Prometheomys within its own subtribe of a broadly defined Prometheomyini (also Alticola, Clethrionomys [= Myodes], Dicrostonyx, Dinaromys, Eolagurus, Eothenomys, Hyperacrius, and Lagurus in other subtribes). Fossil occurrences date from the late Pleistocene of W Asia (Agadzhanyan, 1993; McKenna and Bell, 1997). Stachomys, which ranged widely from Germany to the Lake Baikal region during the middle and late Pliocene, may be the progenitor of Prometheomys, which survived as a relict in the Caucasus Mtns (Agadzhanyan, 1993). |