Badenian and Sarmatian s.str. from the Carpathian area: Taxonomical notes concerning the Hungarian and Romanian small vertebrates and report on the ruminants from the Felsőtárkány Basin

Over the last decade, important progress has been made in the study of the mammal successions from Hungary and Romania. A critical review of the taxonomy of the published small mammals is provided herein, as well as some new data and an overview of the accompanying vertebrate fauna (excluding fishes) in their stratigraphic context. In addition, the first data regarding the ruminants from Matraszőlős and Felsőtarkany are presented. This contribution aims to characterize the middle to earliest late Miocene fossil record from these countries, and provide important data for the chrono(bio)stratigraphic and palaeoenvironmental studies at the European scale.