关键词: 马类, 演化, 地层, 气候环境, 新生代, 中国

Abstract: China’s vast land preserves a sequence of horse fossils spanning 56 million years, constructing a complete global evolutionary chain from their origin, radiation to the rise of extant taxa, providing irreplaceable oriental evidence. The Early Eocene Erihippus tingae from Hengyang, Hunan, fills the gap in the early equid fossil record of Asia. This discovery dates the history of equids in Asia back to the origin stage and reveals a possible early intercontinental migration path from Europe via North America to Asia, revising the traditional view that equids originated only in North America and Europe. The unique picture of equid evolution in China during the Miocene is highlighted, particularly reflected in the symbiotic evolution of Sinohippus and Hipparion, which coexisted in the same strata in northern China, reflecting a mixed forest-steppe landscape. Through methods such as carbon and oxygen isotopes, it is confirmed that the three-toed horse represented by Proboscidipparion is the earliest and most adapted to open grasslands, rather than the later true horses. In addition, the Hipparion fossils from the Tibetan Plateau became key evidence for reconstructing paleoelevation. Equus eisenmannae discovered in the Linxia Basin, Gansu, is the earliest true horse in East Asia, and its symbiosis with the three-toed horse records the generational alternation of evolution. Subsequently, the unique Chinese horses such as E. sanmeniensis and E. qingyangensis exhibited rapid radiation of true horses. Especially crucial are E. sanmeniensis and E. beijingensis from Zhoukoudian as companion animals of Peking Man, which have a large number of fossils witnessing early human hunting activities on horses, indicating the beginning of human intervention in the history of equid evolution.