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  • RESEARCH HIGHLIGHT

Bone scraps hint at whale harvest by ancient Romans

Species now largely vanished from the North Atlantic Ocean once calved and migrated in the Mediterranean Sea.
Gray Whale (Eschrichtius robustus) with barnacles, San Ignacio Lagoon, Baja California, Mexico

Today the grey whale is confined to the Pacific Ocean, but it swam the Mediterranean Sea during the Roman period. Credit: Hiroya Minakuchi/Minden Pictures/FLPA

Ancient whale bones show that grey and right whales once plied the Mediterranean Sea — and might have fuelled a Roman whaling industry.

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Nature 559, 305 (2018)

doi: https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-018-05684-y

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