Thaindian News

July 1, 2010 (Pen Men at Work): The archaeologists in Peru have discovered a huge whale eating whale fossil. Although the specimen has 14-inch teeth in its upper and lower jaws, it looks like the sperm whale of today.

The whale’s unusual large teeth and huge holes in its skull, where the jaw muscles would have been, suggests that it had probably lived on large mammalian sea animals. All these are the assumptions of the scientists.

Scientists named the beast ‘Leviathan Melvillei’, paying tribute to Herman Melville, who is the author of The Whale, the tale of Captain Ahab and Moby Dick.

The whale had been in the oceans since 12 to 13 million years ago and it would have been atop the prehistoric aquatic food chain. The animal stands out because of its long teeth, which are more than a foot.

Olivier Lambert, the National Natural History Museum expert, said, “This whale probably had a body length like that of the largest-known toothed whale Physeter macrocephalus.”

Lambert added, “It means that Leviathan is not the largest whale living on huge prey even though it has the largest teeth and also probably the most powerful bite.” He assumed that this hunter would have probably lived on the defenseless Baleens.

Olivier further said, “Baleen whales were the most common large vertebrates where Leviathan was found. The baleen whales could be the easiest prey for this sperm whale because of their thick layer of blubber and the size.”

The fossil was found by Klaas Post during the research of pre-historic marine life in the fossil-rich area.