Carpological remains from the Pliocene of Almenno and the Early Pleistocene of Leffe in the collections of the Caffi Museum of Bergamo, Italy

The Caffi Museum of Bergamo hosts numerous fossil fruits, seeds, cones and fructifications found in the marine deposits of the Pliocene, close to the village of Almenno, and in the lacustrine deposits of the Early Pleistocene lignite-bearing basin of the historical locality Leffe. Despite the bias towards larger carpological objects, the material can be considered very relevant for the study of the history of vegetation development in Northern Italy during the late Cenozoic, because it originates from independently dated sediments and from an area that is poor in palaeocarpological assemblages. As a result of the palaeocarpological analyses, 8 carpological taxa have been determined at Almenno, and 21 at Leffe, 18 of which could be identified to a modern genus. Eventual previous determinations, often preliminary, are revised, but the occurrence of carpological remains of Carya, Phellodendron and Magnolia is confirmed and well-assessed in the Calabrian. Several fossil-species are reported for the first time in the studied area and permit a comparison with richer assemblages occurring in the neighbouring Piemonte region.