Middle Pleistocene Variations in the Diet of Equus in the South of France and Its Morphometric Adaptations to Local Environments

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

I find this an interesting study of local importance for the research of late Middle and early Late Pleistocene horses in Southern France. Some of the results are somewhat subtle (e.g., nothing conclusive could be said about body size patterns), whereas others are more robust and have a higher significance for enhancing our understanding of Pleistocene horses. This is understandable because of the relatively narrow geographic and temporal range of the study and restricted sample sizes, making this study of local interest above all, but it is nonetheless a valid addition to the understanding of the ecomorphology of Pleistocene Equus in Europe. Attempts to relate ungulate ecomorphological and ecometric traits with associated paleoenvironmental proxy evidence are important for understanding the underlying principles of how such traits are related to climate, vegetation and other environmental variables. The morphometric measurements as well as mesowear and microwear studies are correctly performed, as far as I can tell, they were analysed using correct statistical methods, and they were mostly clearly presented in figures and tables. However, the analysis in Fig. 4 was not in my mind very clearly explained in the methods or the figure caption, so that should be more clearly explained. Throughout the text, I suggest using the term “body mass” rather than “weight” when discussing estimated body masses for clarity. The results indicating that horses with more robust metapodials were associated with more humid (and probably more forested?) environments, and the dietary differences between the “South-West” and “South-East” are in my mind the most valuable findings of this study. I have suggested in the text some alternative hypotheses to be considered, for example about what could explain the robust metapodials of some of the horses from cold environments, and these could be further discussed. One piece of information that might be possible to further explore is which of the horse paleopopulations were more cursorial and which just had tall limbs. This might be possible to do within the scope of this study by calculating ratios of metapodial lengths in relation to more proximal limb bone lengths, and this could further indicate which of the populations were truly cursorial ones (indicating ecotypes most suitable for running in open environments) and which just had overall tall limbs. The manuscript is mostly adequately written, but it could benefit from language checking by a native English speaker. I recommend this manuscript to be published following a moderate revision. See the attached annotated manuscript file for further comments and suggestions.

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Reviewer 2 Report

This is a very interesting study which I wish to see published.  There are organizational concerns that I have:

1. Much of what is included in the Introduction should be elsewhere
2. There should be a Geology-Chronology section.  There desperately needs a table listing the localities, their ages in kyr and an oxygen isotope curve - not everyone interested in this manuscript is a European Paleolithic zooarchaeologist!
3. TAXA!  The author is talking about Equus species.  With certain chronologic control of localities on the Y-axis, localities and their Equus species should be indicated for each locality - is there more than 1 taxon in any locality - if so clearly say so and why.  This should be reinforced in figure and table legends, repeatedly.  What species is/are the author referring to across all these tables and figures.  The author can abbreviate taxonomic names but needs to embed them into the figure and table legends  The reader needs to know really what the species are, their postcranial morphology and diet AND where they are represented geographically and climatically
4. I do not at all understand Figure 4.  "long bone greatest length"?  Is this a ratio between selected long bones and 3rd phalanx (anterior or posterior) length?  How was this calculated?
5. Table 3 & 4 & 5- It is crucial to know IN THESE TABLE LEGENDS which species are at each of these sites.  It will save a lot of confusion
6. Figures 5&6&7&8 - again, have some abbreviations in the legend of what taxa are found at which of these localities
7. In summary, the best way to go is with a short introduction, a comprehensive methods section describing measurements being taken and analytical tests to be performed, a Geology-Chronology section that ordinates localities in time and correlating with a current oxygen isotope curve.  There needs to be supporting figures tabulating which taxa are found at which localities.

Author Response

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Reviewer 3 Report

This is an important manuscript, in which the author combines data from several proxies to reach to palaeoecological conclusions for the area of S. France during the Middle Pleistocene. The text is well written and methodologically sound, suffering, though, a bit linguistically (particularly in the last sections, like the Conclusion). Also, the introductory part is somewhat inflated and more detailed than needed (a direct consequence of its derivation from the author's thesis). The figures are of good quality and the reference list more than complete! In terms of scientific value, a problem constitutes the small sample size in certain localities, which makes the conclusions rather tentative. This, of course, cannot be improved, at least until more material becomes available. For the moment, the author's analysis is well done. Some minor errors that I have spotted, as well as a couple of suggestions, are noted as 'Comments' in the attached PDF. The author may take a look on them and adopt any of them that she considers useful.

Comments for author File: Comments.pdf

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Reviewer 4 Report

I find the manuscript very interesting since the horses of the Upper Middle
Pleistocene are not well known and their paleoecological data less
There are some small things to review and take into account in the conclusions
the fact that some methodologies such as the use of log-ratio diagrams magnify the differences

I marked in yelow a few things in the manuscript

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Reviewer 5 Report

The article is interesting providing evidences for the palaeoenvironment and diet of the genus Equus during the middle Pleistocene in Southern France. It is well organized, using known methods, the analyses of the data is right and the results  useful for  other scientists. I think that it can be published in Quaternary. 

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Round 2

Reviewer 2 Report

I have reviewed the revised document and am satisfied with the quality of the revisions.  THERE IS ONE THING NOT DONE.  I have requested that a chronology be given in kyr, not just MIS correlations.  There is an easy way to fix this, and that is by giving information in an extended Table 1 Legend.  For each MIS interval, the author MUST provide an age range for each MIS interval (as an example, MIS 5 = x.xx - x.xx kyr) with a reference for the age.  If this is done, I would recommend that the manuscript be published.  Not everyone interested in this topic knows out of hand what the chronology is in kyr.  I am one of those scientists!

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