Babelichthys

Babelichthys Temporal range: Middle-Late Eocene
Part and counterpart slabs. Scale bar = 20 mm
Scientific classification
Domain:	Eukaryota
Kingdom:	Animalia
Phylum:	Chordata
Class:	Actinopterygii
Order:	Lampriformes
Family:	Lophotidae
Genus:	†Babelichthys Davesne 2017
Type species
Babelichthys olneyi Davesne 2017

Babelichthys is an extinct genus of crestfish from Western Iran's Pabdeh Formation during the middle to late Eocene. One species is known: Babelichthys olneyi.[1]

The single known specimen consists of a head and the front-most region of the dorsal fin, preserving the extremely elongated and enlarged first dorsal-fin ray.[1]

It and the extant unicorn crestfish (Eumecichthys fiski) are each other's closest known relatives.[1]

Scale bar = 10 mm

Etymology

The genus name Babelichthys means “Babel fish” in Greek, named after the teleost-like, ear-dwelling, polyglot extraterrestrial species from The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, as a reference to the very peculiar, almost alien-like, appearance of the genus. The species name "olneyi" is named after John E. Olney for his work on the anatomy and ontogeny of Lampriformes.[1]

References

1. Davesne, Donald (2017-06-28). "A fossil unicorn crestfish (Teleostei, Lampridiformes, Lophotidae) from the Eocene of Iran". PeerJ. 5: e3381. doi:10.7717/peerj.3381. ISSN 2167-8359. PMC 5493034. PMID 28674642.