''Idiocetus'' ("unique whale") is a

genus Genus ( plural genera ) is a taxonomic rank used in the biological classification of living and fossil organisms as well as viruses. In the hierarchy of biological classification, genus comes above species and below family. In binomial n ...

of extinct cetaceans of the family

Balaenidae Balaenidae () is a family of whales of the parvorder Mysticeti that contains two living genera: the right whales (genus ''Eubalaena''), and in a separate genus, the closely related bowhead whale (genus '' Balaena''). Evolutionary history Bal ...

Discovery

Fossil A fossil (from Classical Latin , ) is any preserved remains, impression, or trace of any once-living thing from a past geological age. Examples include bones, shells, exoskeletons, stone imprints of animals or microbes, objects preserved ...

s belonging to this genus were first found in Piacenzian (Upper

Pliocene The Pliocene ( ; also Pleiocene) is the epoch in the geologic time scale that extends from 5.333 million to 2.58strata In geology and related fields, a stratum ( : strata) is a layer of rock or sediment characterized by certain lithologic properties or attributes that distinguish it from adjacent layers from which it is separated by visible surfaces known as e ...

near

Montopoli in Val d'Arno Montopoli in Val d'Arno is a ''comune'' (municipality) in the Province of Pisa in the Italian region Tuscany, located about southwest of Florence and about east of Pisa. Montopoli in Val d'Arno borders the following municipalities: Castelfranco ...

, a town in

Tuscany it, Toscano (man) it, Toscana (woman) , population_note = , population_blank1_title = , population_blank1 = , demographics_type1 = Citizenship , demographics1_footnotes = , demographics1_title1 = Italian , demogra ...

(central

Italy Italy ( it, Italia ), officially the Italian Republic, ) or the Republic of Italy, is a country in Southern Europe. It is located in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea, and its territory largely coincides with the homonymous geographical ...

). The Italian

paleontologist Paleontology (), also spelled palaeontology or palæontology, is the scientific study of life that existed prior to, and sometimes including, the start of the Holocene epoch (roughly 11,700 years before present). It includes the study of foss ...

Giovanni Capellini Giovanni Capellini (23 August 1833 – 28 May 1922) was an Italian geologist and paleontologist. He was a Senator of the Kingdom of Italy in the seventeenth legislature. Birth and education Giovanni Capellini was born on 23 August 1833 in L ...

described the whale in 1876 and attributed it to a new genus and species, establishing the

type species In zoological nomenclature, a type species (''species typica'') is the species name with which the name of a genus or subgenus is considered to be permanently taxonomically associated, i.e., the species that contains the biological type specimen( ...

''Idiocetus guicciardinii''. Some decades later, in 1926, other fossil remains possibly belonging to the genus were discovered from the

Tortonian The Tortonian is in the geologic time scale an age or stage of the late Miocene that spans the time between 11.608 ± 0.005 Ma and 7.246 ± 0.005 Ma (million years ago). It follows the Serravallian and is followed by the Messinian. The Tort ...

(Upper

Miocene The Miocene ( ) is the first geological epoch of the Neogene Period and extends from about (Ma). The Miocene was named by Scottish geologist Charles Lyell; the name comes from the Greek words (', "less") and (', "new") and means "less recent" ...

) of Japan.''Idiocetus'' on Fossilworks.org
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Discovery

References

Further reading