An Eocene paraclupeid fish (Teleostei, Ellimmichthyiformes) from Bolca, Italy: the youngest marine record of double‐armoured herrings

Abstract

A new double-armoured herring of the clupeomorph order Ellimmichthyiformes, Eoellimmichthys superstes gen. et sp. nov., is described herein based on a single partially complete specimen from the early Eocene Pesciara site of the Bolca Konservat-Lagerst€ atte, north-eastern Italy. The fossil documented herein exhibits a unique combination of features (e.g. ornamentation of the skull bones; medial fusion of the contralateral halves of the neural arches of abdominal vertebrae; teeth on endopterygoid, parhypural fused to the first preural centrum; presence of a short series of 6 (or 7) predorsal scutes increasing in size posteriorly; postpelvic scutes bearing very prominent spines), which clearly supports its recognition as a new genus and species of the family Paraclupeidae. Evidence is provided to show that Eoellimmichthys gen. nov. is most closely related phylogenetically to the Early Cretaceous genus Ellimmichthys. The new taxon described herein represents the youngest marine occurrence of the family Paraclupeidae and, more generally, of the order Ellimmichthyiformes, suggesting that the shallow marine settings of the Tethys might have favoured the persistence of certain fish lineages that were severely affected by the endCretaceous mass extinction.

Guiclupea superstes, gen. et sp. nov., the youngest ellimmichthyiform (clupeomorph) fish to date from the Oligocene of South China

“…Three of these four characters (i.e., 2, 9, and 11) are uniquely derived characters (ci = 1) for this clade. Gasteroclupea and Sorbinichthys lie in the basal position of the Ellimmichthyiformes, but do not form sister groups as suggested by Marramà et al (2019) and Boukhalfa et al (2019). Sorbinichthyidae sensu (Murray & Wilson, 2013) including only the two Sorbinichthys species, is strongly supported by a number of derived characters: broad dorsal process of the posttemporal (15:2), posterior predorsal scutes laterally expanded (41:1), the most posterior predorsal scutes enlarged (44:1), high number of abdominal scutes (51:2), but fewer postpelvic scutes (52:1).…”

Supplemental Material: Diverse marine fish assemblages inhabited the paleotropics during the Paleocene-Eocene thermal maximum

“…Ypresian: "Nummulitic Limestone," Bolca, Italy (Carnevale et al, 2014;Davesne et al, 2016;Marramà et al, 2019Marramà et al, , 2020; Monte Solane, Italy (Giusberti et al, 2014); London Clay Formation, United Kingdom (Friedman et al, 2016); Fur Formation, Fur, Denmark (Bonde, 1997;Bonde et al, 2008);Kapurdi Formation, Rajasthan, India (Sanhi and Choudhary, 1972;Bannikov and Tyler, 1994;Friedman and Johnson, 2005;Forey and Hilton, 2010); Cucullaea I Allomember, La Meseta Formation, Seymour Island, Antarctica (Reguero et al, 2012).…”

On the Albian occurrence of Armigatus (Teleostei, Clupeomorpha) in America, a new species from the Tlayúa Lagerstätte, Mexico

“…The family Armigatidae was erected by Murray and Wilson (2013) to include Armigatus and Diplomystus (also see Vernygora and Murray, 2021); however, this group has not been recovered in some of the latest phyloge-netic hypotheses Marramà and Carnevale, 2016;Ribeiro, 2016, 2017;Boukhalfa et al, 2019;Marramà et al, 2019) (Figure 11). According to Murray and Wilson (2013), this family is unified by two putative synapomorphies, the distal end of uroneural 2 reaches the distal end of the uroneural 1, and the third hypural is posteriorly expanded and leaves no gap between the hypurals 2 and 3.…”

“…nov., mainly because it has no scutes bordering the trunk. Although and Marramà et al (2019) concluded that Ornategulum is a basal ellimmichthyiform based on the presence of the mesoparietal condition of the skull and the lack of the recessus lateralis (Figure 11), other authors have considered this fusiform fish is an incertae sedis species of the order Clupeiformes (Forey, 1973) or even a non-clupeomorph (Zaragüeta-Bagils 2002Boukhalfa et al, 2019).…”

“…Specimen IGM 11532, Armigatus brevissimus from the Cenomanian shallow marine deposits of Hekel, Lebanon, coated with magnesium smoke. while other studies point to the inclusion of Armigatus within this order (Forey, 2004;Hay et al, 2007;Murray and Wilson, 2013;Ribeiro, 2016, 2017;Marramà and Carnevale, 2017;Marramà et al, 2019). Moreover, and Murray et al (2016) claim that Armigatus is monophyletic; however, Figueiredo and Ribeiro (2016) and Boukhalfa et al (2019) challenge such idea and concluded that Armigatus is an unnatural clade.…”