Aquitanian
First Miocene age (23.03–20.45 Ma), originally defined using shallow-marine fossil strata near Saucats, southwest France.
Language and route: French regional name with Latin provincial antecedent. Latin Aquitania → French Aquitaine → historical scientific stage-name Aquitanian. This is a geographical/eponymic formation, not a Greek life-comparison compound.
Literal gloss: of Aquitaine
The name and its history
Karl Mayer (Mayer-Eymar) · 1858
- What does the word literally mean?
- of Aquitaine
- What did the original author mean?
- Mayer assembled lower Miocene fossil beds in Aquitaine into a stage; surviving collections show he had more shell specimens than his brief original lists disclose.
- Why was the name needed?
- The relationship between Oligocene and Miocene and the regional ordering of European 'Tertiary' faunas were disputed; Mayer sought a tighter mollusc-based subdivision.
- What evidence supported the original concept?
- Molluscan species from Saucats and neighbouring sections underpinned the original assignment, although Mayer printed comparatively little faunal evidence.
- How has geology changed the concept?
- The modern base also marks the base of the Neogene at Lemme–Carrosio in Italy; the old Aquitaine units are not a global standard by themselves.
Further historical context
Mayer assembled lower Miocene fossil beds in Aquitaine into a stage; surviving collections show he had more shell specimens than his brief original lists disclose.
The relationship between Oligocene and Miocene and the regional ordering of European 'Tertiary' faunas were disputed; Mayer sought a tighter mollusc-based subdivision.
Molluscan species from Saucats and neighbouring sections underpinned the original assignment, although Mayer printed comparatively little faunal evidence.
The modern base also marks the base of the Neogene at Lemme–Carrosio in Italy; the old Aquitaine units are not a global standard by themselves.
Editorial qualification
Mayer fiercely disputed Beyrich’s Oligocene in some writings; this is part of the underlying classification debate, not a property of the modern age.
Related names
Neogene · Miocene · Chattian · Burdigalian · Oligocene
Sources
- International Commission on Stratigraphy, International Chronostratigraphic Chart v2026/06 — Primary authority for present unit names, hierarchy and boundary ages, not first coinages
- Eames and Clarke (1967), Mayer’s stratotype-area Aquitanian faunas — Explicitly reassesses meagre original 1858 faunal evidence using surviving specimens
- Cahuzac (2008), Karl Mayer and the introduction of Aquitanian — History of Mayer’s 1858 stage and his opposition to Beyrich’s Oligocene
- Cita (2009), Mediterranean Neogene stratigraphy: development and evolution through the centuries — Historic Mediterranean stage competition, fossil correlation, and international standardisation