Casts of Ancient Sea Monster Destroyed in WWII Raids Discovered

Plaster casts of the first complete ichthyosaur have been unearthed in the U.S. and Germany, decades after the original fossils were destroyed in an air raid in World War II.

The discovery, by Dean Lomax and Judy Massare, has revealed new information about this historically significant sea monster.

"Ichthyosaurus was an extinct type of ancient marine reptile that lived in the Jurassic seas," Lomax told Newsweek. "Six species are currently known, including Ichthyosaurus anningae, which Professor Massare and I named after Mary Anning in 2015."

Anning was a pioneering paleontologist in 19th century Britain who is thought to have discovered the first such fossil. "The original specimen represented the first complete skeleton of an ichthyosaur brought to the attention of science," Lomax said.

The fossil was first identified in 1818 at Lyme Regis in Dorset, England. At the time, it was named Proteosaurus, which was later changed to Ichthyosaurus.

In 1819, Sir Everard Home, who studied the fossil, released an article detailing his findings. It included an illustration of the original skeleton by William Clift, which, until recently, has been the only visual evidence we had of the ichthyosaur.

The enigmatic creature had a long, fish-like body but a clearly reptilian skull, which grabbed the attention of naturalists, scientists and collectors at a time before the word "dinosaur" was even invented. While some ichthyosaur species would have been only about 3 feet long, others would have measured more than 85 feet in length.

"Having these casts means that we now have a three-dimensional copy of the original fossil that was destroyed," Lomax said. "This allows us to see features of the original specimen that, up until this point, could only be seen in a single illustration in 1819. It means we're now able to verify the authenticity of the original illustration and compare it with the newfound casts.

"Our research has shown that there are discrepancies between the casts and the original illustration. For example, we were able to identify additional bones in the casts that had not been identified previously, such as bones from the pelvis."

Before these discoveries, no copies of the ichthyosaur skeleton were thought to exist.

"Whilst on a research trip in the USA in 2016, Professor Judy Massare and I were looking through the collections of the Yale Peabody Museum, Yale University, and found the first-known cast," Lomax said.

"In December 2019, I was on a research trip to the Natural History Museum, Berlin (Museum für Naturkunde Berlin) accompanied by Natalie Turner, where I found the second specimen in the museum collections."

The casts were made at different times. The Berlin cast was the more pristine of the two, but it is thought that the Yale cast may have been produced in the years immediately following the discovery, more than two centuries ago.

Lomax and Massare have revealed their findings in a paper, published in the journal Royal Society Open Science.