An international team led by Dr. Paul Burke of the Swedish Museum of Natural History has identified a new species of extinct long-snouted crocodile from fossils dug out of Egypt's Mokattam Formation — the same limestone ancient Egyptians quarried to build the Great Sphinx and the pyramids at Giza. The animal, now named *Herugavialis cairensis*, hunted fish in a warm, shallow sea that covered northern Egypt about 45 million years ago, long before the monument existed. The fossils, including a nearly complete skull, were recovered in the 1920s and initially assigned to the false gharial genus *Tomistoma* because of their superficial resemblance.

*Herugavialis* belonged to the gavials, crocodilians defined by long, thin snouts. According to CNN, its razor-sharp, pointed teeth, paired with that slender snout, were adapted for capturing fish, and the Mokattam Formation preserves the bony and cartilaginous fish fossils it likely fed on. Burke also noted the eye sockets were raised like a telescope, so the semiaquatic predator's eyes protruded from the skull, similar to the Indian gharial. The formation also preserves fish, sharks and early whales, painting a rich picture of a shallow marine ecosystem.

*Herugavialis* was not alone. CNN reports it is one of six gharial species known from the Mediterranean across a 43-million-year span from 66 to 23 million years ago, and phys.org notes at least two other gavial species shared Egypt's shallow seas at the time. 'Throughout much of the last 50 million years, the Mediterranean region hosted a high diversity of crocodiles, including gavials,' Burke said, but that diversity fluctuated with global temperature and sea level before the Mediterranean largely dried up around 6 million years ago, wiping out all crocodiles in the region. Today only two gavial species survive — the critically endangered gharial and the endangered false gharial — both in freshwaters of South and Southeast Asia.

The discovery underscores how much remains hidden in century-old museum collections. 'There are other fossils in similar situations, but often this is just about time and resources,' Mannion told CNN, adding that he thinks it is very likely other fossils will continue to be found in the Mokattam Formation, with prehistoric turtles one potential example. Meanwhile, the study lands amid a wider crocodilian conservation story: according to Mongabay, when the IUCN's Crocodile Specialist Group formed in 1971 every crocodilian species was considered endangered or threatened, and today more than half are listed as least concern — though habitat loss remains the biggest problem for five of the seven most threatened species.