''Xiphactinus'' (from

Latin Latin (, or , ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally a dialect spoken in the lower Tiber area (then known as Latium) around present-day Rome, but through the power ...

and

Greek Greek may refer to: Greece Anything of, from, or related to Greece, a country in Southern Europe: *Greeks, an ethnic group. *Greek language, a branch of the Indo-European language family. **Proto-Greek language, the assumed last common ancestor ...

for "

sword A sword is an edged, bladed weapon intended for manual cutting or thrusting. Its blade, longer than a knife or dagger, is attached to a hilt and can be straight or curved. A thrusting sword tends to have a straighter blade with a pointed t ...

-ray") is an extinct genus of large (Shimada, Kenshu, and Michael J. Everhart. "Shark-bitten Xiphactinus audax (Teleostei: Ichthyodectiformes) from the Niobrara Chalk (Upper Cretaceous) of Kansas." The Mosasaur 7 (2004): 35-39.) predatory marine

bony fish Osteichthyes (), popularly referred to as the bony fish, is a diverse superclass of fish that have skeletons primarily composed of bone tissue. They can be contrasted with the Chondrichthyes, which have skeletons primarily composed of cartila ...

that lived during the

Late Cretaceous The Late Cretaceous (100.5–66 Ma) is the younger of two epochs into which the Cretaceous Period is divided in the geologic time scale. Rock strata from this epoch form the Upper Cretaceous Series. The Cretaceous is named after ''creta'', ...

(

Albian The Albian is both an age of the geologic timescale and a stage in the stratigraphic column. It is the youngest or uppermost subdivision of the Early/Lower Cretaceous Epoch/ Series. Its approximate time range is 113.0 ± 1.0 Ma to 100.5 ± ...

Maastrichtian The Maastrichtian () is, in the ICS geologic timescale, the latest age (uppermost stage) of the Late Cretaceous Epoch or Upper Cretaceous Series, the Cretaceous Period or System, and of the Mesozoic Era or Erathem. It spanned the interv ...

). Species in the genus bore a superficial resemblance to a gargantuan, fanged

tarpon Tarpons are fish of the genus ''Megalops''. They are the only members of the family Megalopidae. Of the two species, one (''M. atlanticus'') is native to the Atlantic, and the other (''M. cyprinoides'') to the Indo-Pacific Oceans. Species an ...

. The species ''Portheus molossus'' described by Cope is a junior synonym of ''X. audax''. Skeletal remains of ''Xiphactinus'' have come from the

Carlile Shale The Carlile Shale is a Turonian age Upper Cretaceous, Upper/Late Cretaceous series shale geologic Formation (geology), formation in the central-western United States, including in the Great Plains region of Colorado, Kansas, Nebraska, New Mexico ...

and

Greenhorn Limestone The Greenhorn Limestone or Greenhorn Formation is a geologic formation in the Great Plains Region of the United States, dating to the Cenomanian and Turonian ages of the Late Cretaceous period. The formation gives its name to the Greenhorn cyc ...

Kansas Kansas () is a state in the Midwestern United States. Its capital is Topeka, and its largest city is Wichita. Kansas is a landlocked state bordered by Nebraska to the north; Missouri to the east; Oklahoma to the south; and Colorado to ...

(where the first ''Xiphactinus'' fossil was discovered during the 1850s in the

Niobrara Chalk The Niobrara Formation , also called the Niobrara Chalk, is a geologic formation in North America that was deposited between 87 and 82 million years ago during the Coniacian, Santonian, and Campanian stages of the Late Cretaceous. It is compose ...

),''Xiphactinus''
at

Fossilworks Fossilworks is a portal which provides query, download, and analysis tools to facilitate access to the Paleobiology Database, a large relational database assembled by hundreds of paleontologists from around the world. History Fossilworks was cre ...

.org and Cretaceous formations all over the

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(most notably

Georgia Georgia most commonly refers to: * Georgia (country), a country in the Caucasus region of Eurasia * Georgia (U.S. state), a state in the Southeast United States Georgia may also refer to: Places Historical states and entities * Related to t ...

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North Carolina North Carolina () is a state in the Southeastern region of the United States. The state is the 28th largest and 9th-most populous of the United States. It is bordered by Virginia to the north, the Atlantic Ocean to the east, Georgia a ...

, and

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) in the

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 U.S. state, states, a Washington, D.C., federal district, five ma ...

, as well as

Europe Europe is a large peninsula conventionally considered a continent in its own right because of its great physical size and the weight of its history and traditions. Europe is also considered a subcontinent of Eurasia and it is located enti ...

, Australia, the Kanguk and Ashville Formations of

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La Luna Formation LA most frequently refers to Los Angeles, the second largest city in the United States. La, LA, or L.A. may also refer to: Arts and entertainment Music * La (musical note), or A, the sixth note * "L.A.", a song by Elliott Smith on ''Figure ...

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and the

Salamanca Formation The Salamanca Formation is a geologic formation in the Golfo San Jorge Basin of central Patagonia that yields well-preserved, well-dated fossils from the early Paleocene. Studies of these fossils are providing new data on plant and animal diversit ...

Argentina Argentina (), officially the Argentine Republic ( es, link=no, República Argentina), is a country in the southern half of South America. Argentina covers an area of , making it the second-largest country in South America after Brazil, t ...

Paleobiology

Species of ''Xiphactinus'' were voracious predatory fish. At least a dozen specimens of ''X. audax'' have been collected with the remains of large, undigested or partially digested prey in their stomachs. In particular, one fossil "Fish-Within-A-Fish" specimen was collected by George F. Sternberg with another, nearly perfectly preserved long ichthyodectid ''

Gillicus arcuatus ''Gillicus'' was a relatively small, 2-metre long ichthyodectiform fish that lived in the Western Interior Seaway, in what is now central North America, during the Late Cretaceous. Description Like its larger relative, ''Ichthyodectes ctenodo ...

'' inside of it. The larger fish apparently died soon after eating its prey, most likely owing to the smaller prey's struggling and rupturing an organ as it was being swallowed. This fossil is on display at the Sternberg Museum of Natural History in

Hays, Kansas Hays is a city in and the county seat of Ellis County, Kansas, United States. The largest city in northwestern Kansas, it is the economic and cultural center of the region. As of the 2020 census, the population of the city was 21,116. It is ...

. Like many other species in the Late Cretaceous oceans, a dead or injured individual was likely to be scavenged by sharks (''

Cretoxyrhina ''Cretoxyrhina'' (; meaning 'Cretaceous sharp-nose') is an extinct genus of large mackerel shark that lived about 107 to 73 million years ago during the late Albian to late Campanian of the Late Cretaceous. The type species, ''C. mantelli'', is m ...

'' and ''

Squalicorax ''Squalicorax'', commonly known as the crow shark, is a genus of extinct lamniform shark known to have lived during the Cretaceous period. The genus had a global distribution in the Late Cretaceous epoch. Multiple species within this genus are c ...

''). The remains of a ''Xiphactinus'' were found within a large specimen of ''

'' collected by Charles H. Sternberg. The specimen is on display at the University of Kansas Museum of Natural History. Virtually nothing is known about the larval or juvenile stages. The smallest fossil specimen of ''X. audax'' consists of a tooth-bearing

premaxilla The premaxilla (or praemaxilla) is one of a pair of small cranial bones at the very tip of the upper jaw of many animals, usually, but not always, bearing teeth. In humans, they are fused with the maxilla. The "premaxilla" of therian mammal has ...

and lower jaws of an individual estimated to be about long. The species and all other ichthyodectids became extinct near the end of the

– see

Cretaceous–Paleogene extinction event The Cretaceous–Paleogene (K–Pg) extinction event (also known as the Cretaceous–Tertiary extinction) was a sudden extinction event, mass extinction of three-quarters of the plant and animal species on Earth, approximately 66 million y ...

. An incomplete

skull The skull is a bone protective cavity for the brain. The skull is composed of four types of bone i.e., cranial bones, facial bones, ear ossicles and hyoid bone. However two parts are more prominent: the cranium and the mandible. In humans, t ...

of what may be a new species of ''Xiphactinus'' was found in 2002 in the

Czech Republic The Czech Republic, or simply Czechia, is a landlocked country in Central Europe. Historically known as Bohemia, it is bordered by Austria to the south, Germany to the west, Poland to the northeast, and Slovakia to the southeast. Th ...

, in a small town called Šachov next to

Borohrádek Borohrádek (; german: Heideburg) is a town in Rychnov nad Kněžnou District in the Hradec Králové Region of the Czech Republic. It has about 2,100 inhabitants. Administrative parts The village of Šachov is an administrative part of Borohr ...

city, by then 16-year-old student Michal Matějka. In July 2010 the bones of a ''Xiphactinus'' were discovered near Morden, Manitoba, Canada. The specimen was about long and was found with the flipper of a

mosasaur Mosasaurs (from Latin ''Mosa'' meaning the 'Meuse', and Ancient Greek, Greek ' meaning 'lizard') comprise a group of extinct, large marine reptiles from the Late Cretaceous. Their first fossil remains were discovered in a limestone quarry at Ma ...

between its jaws.

"Unicerosaurus"

In 1982, a former Baptist minister,

Carl Baugh Carl Edward Baugh (born October 21, 1936) is an American young Earth creationist. Baugh has claimed to have discovered human footprints alongside dinosaur footprints near the Paluxy River in Texas. Baugh promoted creationism as the former host o ...

, began excavations on the limestone beds of the Paluxy River, near

Glen Rose, Texas Glen Rose is a city in and the county seat of Somervell County, Texas, United States. As of the 2012 census estimate, the city population was 2,502. History 19th century The area was first settled in 1849 by Charles Barnard, who opened a tradi ...

, famous for its dinosaur tracks. Some of the tracks resembled human footprints and had been proclaimed since 1900 as evidence that dinosaurs and modern humans had once lived alongside one another. Scientists' investigations found the supposed human footprints to be "forms of elongate dinosaur tracks, while others were selectively highlighted erosional markings, and still others (on loose blocks) probable carvings." While excavating, he found a solitary "Y-shaped" fossil that he informally called "Unicerosaurus". In a 1987 popular article, John Armstrong described the fossil as a "Y-shaped petrified bone that appears to be the neural spine from a huge fish like the ''Portheus'' of

" that Baugh's museum "declared to be the forehead horn of a newly discovered dinosaur genus". The museum's exhibit told visitors that the "horn" belonged to "the

unicorn The unicorn is a legendary creature that has been described since Classical antiquity, antiquity as a beast with a single large, pointed, spiraling horn (anatomy), horn projecting from its forehead. In European literature and art, the unicor ...

of Job 38, one of three dinosaurs mentioned in Scripture; the others being behemoth and leviathan of Job 40 and 41", and that the horn was able to fold back like the blade of a jack knife. Although some Young Earth Creationists shared Baugh's interpretations of the biblical

Behemoth Behemoth (; he, בְּהֵמוֹת, ''bəhēmōṯ'') is a beast from the biblical Book of Job, and is a form of the primeval chaos-monster created by God at the beginning of creation; he is paired with the other chaos-monster, Leviathan, and ...

and

Leviathan Leviathan (; he, לִוְיָתָן, ) is a sea serpent noted in theology and mythology. It is referenced in several books of the Hebrew Bible, including Psalms, the Book of Job, the Book of Isaiah, the Book of Amos, and, according to so ...

, Baugh's claims were not taken seriously either by Christian organizations or the scientific community.

In popular culture

In October 2010, Kansas House Rep. Tom Sloan (R-Lawrence) announced that he would introduce legislation to make ''Xiphactinus audax'', a.k.a. the "X-fish", the state fossil of Kansas.

Notes

References

External links

BBC

Canadian Fossil Discovery Centre
{{Taxonbar, from=Q131444 Ichthyodectidae Marine fish genera Prehistoric ray-finned fish genera Late Cretaceous fish of North America Cretaceous Canada Fossils of Canada Cretaceous United States Fossils of the United States Cretaceous fish of Europe Prehistoric fish of Australia Prehistoric fish of South America Cretaceous Venezuela Fossils of Venezuela Albian genus first appearances Cenomanian genera Turonian genera Coniacian genera Santonian genera Campanian genera Maastrichtian genus extinctions Demopolis Chalk Mooreville Chalk Fossil taxa described in 1870 Taxa named by Joseph Leidy Cretaceous Argentina Golfo San Jorge Basin Salamanca Formation