Geologia Croatica Aspects of Romanian Palaeozoic Palaeobotany and Palynology . Part III . The Late Carboniferous flora of Baia Nouă , Sirinia Basin

Early–Middle Pennsylvanian (late Carboniferous) age coalbearing strata in Europe can be found in two general depositional settings (OPLUŠTIL & CLEAL, 2007; CLEAL et al., 2010, 2011). The most extensive deposits were formed in paralic settings, most notably on the Variscan Foreland and associated basins between the British Isles and northern Turkey, in the Donets Basin of eastern Europe, and the Cantabrian Basin of the Iberian Peninsula. Together, these basins cover an area of up to 9 x105 km2 (CLEAL & THOMAS, 2005). In addition there are several intramontane basins associated with the Variscan Mountains, such as Saar-Lorraine (France and Germany), West and Central Bohemia (Czech Republic), Svoge (Bulgaria) and the Stephanian basins of southern France. Although much smaller than the paralic basins, they are of interest because of what they tell us about the evolution of the Variscan Mountains and the distinctive fossil biotas that they yield, especially the macrofloras, which probably reflect at least in part their relatively high elevation during Pennsylvanian times. There is evidence of at least two such Pennsylvanianage intramontane basins in the south Carpathians in Romania, the Reşiţa Basin within the Getic Nappe and the Sirinia Basin in the western Upper Danubian realm (Danubian Units). Neither is particularly well exposed and what coal mining did occur there has now ceased. Nevertheless, both have yielded fossil biotas which are of biostratigraphical and palaeobiogeographical interest (see DRaGaStaN et al., 1997 and POPA, 2005 for historical reviews). In the present paper we document macrofloras from the Sirinia Basin found at Baia Nouă (also known in the Czech language as Nové Doly) located in the Dubova Commune, Mehedinţi County, in the central area of the Iron Gates Natural Park, the largest natural park in Romania. Ab sTRA CT