Plesiobalaenoptera quarantellii

Plesiobalaenoptera quarantellii is an extinct rorqual, a member of the baleen whale family Balaenopteridae, and the type species of the genus Plesiobalaenoptera. It lived in what is now northern Italy during the late Miocene and is the oldest known rorqual from the Mediterranean basin. Its fossils come from sediments of the Stirone River that were laid down in the Tortonian age, around 11 to 7 million years ago. It looked much like other rorquals but had a relatively wider rostrum, and it is told apart mainly by features of the ear region, including a periotic bone with a raised central portion and a tympanic bulla with a distinctive high keel. A hole in the dentary bone of the lower jaw suggests it was probably not capable of the ram feeding that living rorquals use, and it is closely related to Parabalaenoptera from the late Miocene of California.