When British scientist Jennifer Clack named a fossil creature "Eucritta melanolimnetes" in a paper she submitted for publication, an editor asked if she was sure about that name.
She was. So in Thursday's issue of the prestigious journal Nature, Clack introduces the animal and its name, which loosely translates as "creature from the black lagoon."Her animal didn't look like the fish-human hybrid that starred in the 1954 horror movie. It was a lot smaller and resembled a salamander with a big head and feet. It lived near what is now Edinburgh, Scotland, some 333 million years ago.
Fossils of the animal were found by Clack's husband, an amateur fossil collector, in 1986 and a professional collector in 1989.
Clack, a senior assistant curator at Cambridge University's zoology museum, said she first added the ancient Greek word "eu" to American slang to indicate "true critter." That sounded rather nice, she said, and she added the "black lagoon" part from the Greek because the creature lived by a hot-spring lake that probably had poisonous water. "Melano" means black and "limnetes" refers to a pool or marsh.
Scientists have to follow a few rules when they name a species. The names can't be "rude or libelous," Clack noted, and they consist of two words, usually with Latinized or Greek endings. Names of people or places are among the options scientists can choose.
Although the creature belongs to a previously known family, Clack placed it in a new sub-category, or genus, which is the "Eucritta" part of the name.
The discovery includes a nearly complete skeleton that measures about 8 inches from nose to pelvis; it's missing the tail. Clack said the creature apparently grew longer, judging by another recovered skull, but she doesn't know how long.
The finding sheds light on the evolution of tetrapods, backboned animals that have four limbs with fingers and toes or which descended from such creatures. Two groups of tetrapods are alive today. One includes mammals, turtles, birds, lizards and other creatures, while the second group includes such animals as frogs and salamanders.
The fossil combines traits from both living groups, indicating it lived around the time the two groups split in evolutionary history, Clack said.
Scientists have disagreed on when that split happened. The new finding suggests it occurred maybe 340 million years ago, which falls between the dates suggested before, she said.
As for what her fellow scientists think of the name, Clack said: "Some of them really like it. Some of them are a bit sniffy."