Ichthyolestes

Ichthyolestes Temporal range: Early Eocene,
Scientific classification
Domain:	Eukaryota
Kingdom:	Animalia
Phylum:	Chordata
Class:	Mammalia
Order:	Artiodactyla
Infraorder:	Cetacea
Family:	†Pakicetidae
Genus:	†Ichthyolestes Dehm & Oettingen-Spielberg 1958
Species:	†I. pinfoldi
Binomial name
†Ichthyolestes pinfoldi Dehm & Oettingen-Spielberg 1958

Ichthyolestes ("fish thief") is a genus of extinct early whale belonging to the family Pakicetidae endemic to northern Pakistan, living during the Lutetian stage.

Ichthyolestes, the oldest of the pakicetids, had semicircular canals in the inner ear the same size as the living relatives of cetaceans, the artiodactyls, in contrast to the reduced size found in later pakicetids and protocetids, such as Remingtonocetus, Indocetus, and Dorudon, and extant cetaceans.

References

• Dehm, Richard; Oettingen-Spielberg, Therese zu (1958). Paläontologische und geologische Untersuchungen im Tertiär von Pakistan. 2. Die mitteleocänen Säugetiere von Ganda Kas bei Basal in Nordwest-Pakistan. Abhandlungen / Neue Folge, 91. Munich: Beck. OCLC 163296508. {{cite book}}: Invalid |ref=harv (help)
• Spoor, F.; Bajpai, S.; Hussain, S. T.; Kumar, K.; Thewissen, J. G. (2002). "Vestibular evidence for the evolution of aquatic behaviour in early cetaceans" (PDF). Nature. 417 (6885): 163–66. doi:10.1038/417163a. PMID 12000957. {{cite journal}}: Invalid |ref=harv (help)