Audio tour 1. Paleontological Collections

A large paleontological collection, with fossils and osteological and malacological finds, is exhibited in the showcases at numbers 1, 2, 3 and 4 of the museum.

In the showcase 1 there are teeth of shark megalodon, a clypeaster (a sea urchin), sea urchins spatangoids, echinids; gasteropods, solitary corals, silicized fossil wood; nautiloids, bivalve shells; Cardium and internal tracks of bivalves. All dated to Miocene and Miocene/Pliocene.

In showcase 2 are exposed a crab (Cancer sismondae), various Pecten jacobaeus, limestones' fragments, ostreids, brachiopods, fossil corals. All dated to Pliocene and Pliocene/Pleistocene. The lower shelf shows shells associated with prehistoric remnants of the culture of Castelluccio.

At the first three shelves of the showcase 3 we find molars and incisors of dwarf elephants lived in the Pleistocene and found in Bussello and Granieri. The first shelf presents to the number 1 molars of Elephas falconeri and to the number 2 molars of Elephas mnaidriensis. Below, fragments of incisors (or fangs) of Elephas mnaidriensis. The lower shelf, on the other hand, contains helicoids, or pulmonate terrestrial gastropods.

Showcase 4 contains the most recent fossils: it is dated from the middle-upper Pleistocene to the Holocene. The exhibited fragments belong to Bos, Bos taurus, Sus scrofa, found in a locality of Modica called "Mista".

These findings confirm the richness and variety of the fauna of the Modica area before the arrival of man.