GIANT PREDATORY SEA MONSTER FOSSIL FOUND

“WHALE EATING” WHALE FOSSIL DISCOVERED
LONG-EXTINCT CANNIBAL RULED ANCIENT SEAS

LONDON (AP) - Scientists have discovered an ancient whale whose bite ripped huge chunks of flesh out of other whales about 12 million years ago - and they’ve named it after the author of “Moby-Dick.” The prehistoric sperm whale grew to between 13 and 18 meters (up to 60 feet) long, not unusual by today’s standards. But unlike modern sperm whales, Leviathan Melvillei, sported vicious, tusk-like teeth some 36 centimeters (14 inches) long. The ancient beast evidently dined on other whales, researchers said in Thursday’s issue of the journal Nature. They report finding a skull of the beast in a Peruvian desert. The researchers named it in tribute to the 19th-century author and his classic tale of the great white whale, which includes frequent digressions on natural history that punctuate the action. Anthony Friscia, a paleontologist at the University of California, LA, who wasn’t involved in the discovery, said scattered finds of huge fossilized teeth had long hinted at the ancient whale’s existence. But without a skull to fit them in, the creature’s shape, size and feeding habits remained a mystery. The ancient beasts “were the killer whales of their time, although on a much grander scale,” Friscia said. “They were close to the biggest things around.”

After finding the enormous fossil, scientists started debating on what the giant creature might have eaten to survive. They believe it’s possible that those huge sperm whales depended on baleen whales to fulfill their hunger and nutritional needs. Olivier Lambert, paleontologist at the National Museum of Natural History in Paris, explained: “It was larger than other marine mammals existing at that time, even baleen whales that were smaller than most of the living baleen whales.” It has been named “Leviathan Melvillei”; ‘Leviathan’ after a sea monster in the Bible and ‘Melville’ after the author of novel ‘Moby Dick’, Herman Melville.

Here you can watch a video about this research

References about the whale-eater, called “Timingila” are found in Vedic literature: the Bhagavatam, Ramayana and the Mahabharata. One may ask: how did the Vedic culture of these animals that science considered only fantastic myths and imaginary legends? Scientists should find reliable knowledge in the Vedas.

WHAT DO THE VEDIC TEACHINGS TELL US?

The Śrīmad Bhagavatam, Ramayana, Mahabharata and other Vedic literatures often speak of fantastic places and of creatures that may have once lived on this planet. One such creature was the Timingila fish. The Timingila is said to have been the most formidable predator in the oceans. It was enormous in size and its favorite food was said to have been whales. ... In Sanskrit ‘timi’ is the word for ‘whale’ and ‘gila’ means ‘to swallow’. Thus ‘timingila’ literally means ‘to swallow a whale’ ... Western scholars assert that the Bhagavatam was only written in the 9th century CE, the Ramayana in the 4th century BCE, and the Mahabharata between the 8th and 4th centuries BCE. But if this were a fact, then how did the writers of these books know about an ocean-dwelling creature that had been extinct for 1.5 million years? for us the answer is simple - there have always been human beings on this planet from its very creation and the knowledge of all such things has been passed down thru the ages via the disciplic succession of gurus and disciples.

Śrīla Bhakti Gaurava Narasingha Maharaja :
“Timingila - Myth or Fact?”
Shri Narasingha Chaitanya Matha
http://www.gosai.com/krishna-talk/88-timingila-makara-fish.html
http://www.vina.cc/news/index.php/Philosophical/Timingila-Myth-or-Fact.html