The living coelacanth
In December 1938 museum curator Marjorie Courtenay-Latimer spotted a strange blue fish in a trawler's catch at East London: a coelacanth, a group thought extinct for 66 million years.
1938 CE · -33.02, 27.91 · status: official
The account
The fish had been netted near the mouth of the Chalumna River. Ichthyologist J. L. B. Smith identified it and named it Latimeria chalumnae. A second specimen was found only in 1952, in the Comoros. The case is often cited by cryptozoologists to show large animals can escape science.
The sceptical view
A real zoological discovery, not a cryptid: it shows that unknown animals can turn up, not that any particular legendary creature exists.
The researched reading
A real “living fossil” found in a trawler’s catch. It shows that large animals can escape science for a long time, but it is no evidence for any particular legendary creature.
| Explanation | Weight | Why |
|---|---|---|
| An unknown or out-of-place animal | 96% | A real coelacanth, mounted and described as Latimeria chalumnae. Its internal organs were lost before Smith arrived, but the skin and skeleton were enough, and the 1952 Comoros fish and hundreds since confirm the species. |
| Something known, misidentified | 1% | Smith’s identification has been confirmed in every respect. |
| A hoax or fabrication | 1% | Excluded by the specimen and later catches. |
| A cultural story | 1% | Cryptozoology retells the find, but it rests on a specimen. |
| Perception, memory or mind | 1% | Not relevant. |
| Genuinely anomalous | 0% | A surviving lineage is ordinary biology. |
Official position: A confirmed zoological discovery.