Fossil named after Sir David Attenborough - BBC News

Find Your Perfect ONLINE JOB

A 430-million-year-old fossil has recently been named after broadcaster and naturalist, Sir David Attenborough. The ancient fossil was discovered frozen in time in ancient volcanic rock. The tiny crustacean, which measures less than 1/2 inch long, was found by researchers in Herefordshire, England. The fossil has been named Cascolus Ravitis, which is the first word a Latin rendering of the Old English equivalent to Attenborough. Ravitis is a reference to the Roman name for Leicester, which is where Sir David Attenborough lived on the city's university campus. The 430 million-year-old fossil was given its name by researchers from the universities of Oxford, Yale, Leicester, and Imperial College London. Of the fossil naming, Attenborough said that the biggest compliment a biologist or paleontologist could pay to another one is to name a fossil after them. The ancient fossil is just the latest in a long list of objects and species that are named after the famous naturalist and broadcaster. Sir David Attenborough who turned 90 in May of last year, grew up on the campus of the former University College Leicester where his father Frederick was the principal at the school. One of the reasons that Sir David Attenborough became a naturalist was by collecting Jurassic rock fossils throughout much of his childhood in the Leicester countryside.

Sir David Frederick Attenborough is an English naturalist and veteran broadcaster. Sir David is best known for his writing and presenting the nine Life series, in conjunction with the BBC Natural History Unit. This series collectively forms a comprehensive survey of both animal and plant life on the planet. Attenborough is also a former senior manager at the BBC, having served as director of programming for BBC Television in the 1960s and 70s and as controller of BBC Two. Sir David is the only person to have won BAFTAs for programs in each of HD, 3D black and white, and color. Sir David is considered by many to be a national treasure in Britain, but he, however, does not like that term. In 2002 Attenborough was named among the 100 Greatest Britons following a United Kingdom-wide poll for the BBC. Attenborough is the younger brother of producer, director, and actor Richard Attenborough, and the older brother of motor executive John Attenborough. Attenborough spent much of his childhood collecting stones, fossils, and other natural specimens. The naming of the 430 million fossils after Sir David is a compliment to the well-known naturalist and broadcaster especially considering his love of fossils.

This fossil isn't the only thing to be named after the naturalist. Other things to be named after Sir David Frederick Attenborough include a pygmy grasshopper species that was named Electrotettix Attenboroughi. The grasshopper found in 2014 was preserved in amber in the Dominican Republic. A long-beaked echidna that was named Zaglossus Attenboroughi that lives in the forested areas of New Guinea. A rare butterfly that lives in the tropical forests in places like Brazil and Columbia was named Euptychia Attenboroughi, in honor of the naturalists love for butterflies, which live in tropical forests in places like Colombia and Brazil. A flightless weevil from Indonesia was named Trigonopterus Attenboroughi. A species of wildflower discovered in the Brecon Beacons named the Attenborough Hawkweed. Plesiosaur Attenborosaurus Conybeare, this type of type of sea reptile lived millions of years ago. And a polar research ship called the RRS Sir David Attenborough.

This is just one of the stories trending on the BBC site. On the BBC site, you will also find world, business, celebrity rumors, tech, science, news about famous people, new celebrity news and so much more. **

Learn MORE at BBC


To help with slow website load, we have put all photos for this article here: View photo gallery.