Early and Middle Pleistocene equids from Norfolk and northern Suffolk

Five species of equids have been identified in the Cromer Forest Bed Formation. Equus stenonis indicates a Late Pliocene to Early Pleistocene age; E. bressanus is restricted to the later part of the Early Pleistocene (end of late Villafranchian); E süssenbornensis and E. altidens typify the early Middle Pleistocene (Galerian, approximately equivalent to the Cromerian of pollen stratigraphy); Equus caballus ranges from Middle Pleistocene to Holocene. Equids thus substantiate the conclusion, arrived at through the study of other mammals, that preglacial sediments of the Norfolk coast include horizons ranging over a time span that includes the Early Pleistocene and part of the Middle Pleistocene.